by Lisa Henry
“This is going to be harder than I thought,” Marianne said, pulling out a photo album. “This wasn’t in Dad’s study, was it?”
Elliott took the album from her and ran his fingers over the cover. He opened it. “It’s their wedding album.”
Henry and Abby smiled out from the pages.
A courthouse wedding. A few friends. No Family. Odette was there, looking like she hadn’t aged a day. She hadn’t, probably, through sheer force of will. There were a few other people Elliott recognized. Friends of their parents. Strange, but he’d never thought whose friends. He’d never wondered if his father had brought any of them over from his old life. Maybe he had, or maybe they’d all shunned him. Told him he was stupid to choose the woman over the money. Because that’s what it had been, and not just in the end. The Family had never tolerated Henry’s choice; they’d packed him off to Massachusetts so they could ignore it. They’d never accepted it, and they’d never accepted Abby, Elliott, Marianne, or Greta.
Sins of the father.
Damned in perpetuity.
Something like that.
It hadn’t seemed strange to Elliott, growing up. It was just the way things were. But now, he tried to think of any reason he’d shun Marianne like that, or Greta. He couldn’t think of one.
“I think I’m glad they didn’t like us,” he said, touching the thin sheet of plastic that covered his father’s smiling face. “Can you imagine what assholes we would have turned out to be if they had?”
“God,” Marianne said, eyes wide. “Such assholes.” She snatched the album back. “But with impeccable table manners!”
Elliott looked at the album. “I think that was in their bedroom closet, wasn’t it?”
“Was it?” Marianne asked, wrinkling her nose.
“I think so.” Elliott warmed with affection for John, who must have put everything together. The album easily could have ended up in a trash heap somewhere, and probably would have if anyone else in the Family had been in charge. This way, even if they didn’t need it for the exhibit, they could take it home to Abby.
He should text John. Thank him.
They continued to sort through the boxes.
“What is Odette aiming for, do you think?” Marianne asked at one point, her brow furrowed. “I mean, who are we supposed to be looking for in here? Henry Dashwood the artist, or Dad?”
“I don’t know. I guess maybe the point where they intersect?”
It was hard.
“I wish Mom was here,” Marianne said quietly when she pulled one of Henry’s paint-stained palettes from a box. The paint was dried in globs on the surface of the palette, like the ridges and dips on a contour map.
“Yeah.” Elliott reached for the palette and bent his neck to see if he could catch the scent of the paint still. He wondered if the paints on it were from Henry’s last project, or if this was the palette Elliott had used that day he and Ned had . . .
Warmth rose in him, and he felt himself flush.
Jerked each other off frantically against a canvas?
There was no way to say that without it sounding filthy. Which it had been, in all the best ways. Elliott had been picking paint out of his hair half the way to California.
Still, he regretted it as well, and not just because of the way things had worked out—or hadn’t—with Ned. Mostly he regretted how it had led to their very hasty departure from Norland Park. He wished they’d had longer to pack. If Abby hadn’t been fuming with righteous indignation, no way in hell would she have forgotten her wedding album. And okay, she’d get that back now, at least, but what about Greta’s favorite T-shirt? What about the little things they hadn’t even missed yet?
Marianne flipped through a sketchbook. “I think that whole thing about Mom having to stay in California because of Greta’s school was bullshit.” She met Elliott’s gaze. “Since when has Mom cared about stuff like school? Also, she could have left Greta with John and Paula. I think she just didn’t want to come.”
“I think you’re right,” Elliott said. “I think she wants us to do this because she knew she couldn’t. I don’t know if she’s even really accepted it yet, you know?”
All that positive thinking, all that healthy eating and meditation and yoga, and none of it had made a difference.
“Elliott,” Henry had said toward the end, “you’ll watch out for your mom, won’t you? She’s going to take this hard, I think.”
As though Elliott somehow wouldn’t? Except he knew what his dad meant. His dad’s illness hadn’t fundamentally changed Elliott’s worldview. His death hadn’t. Abby, though . . . Abby hadn’t been ready because she hadn’t really believed it would happen.
“We’ll be okay though,” Elliott said quietly. “You and me, we can do this, Mar.”
“Yeah.” Marianne sniffed and wiped her eyes on the cuff of her sleeve. “It’s gonna be messy though.”
“Yeah,” Elliott murmured. “It is.”
***
Odette appeared back at the gallery just before six with two pizzas and a six-pack of imported beer. Lucien doled out napkins, and they sat around on the floor, surrounded by the detritus of Henry’s life, and ate.
“The paintings from Norland Park are in storage,” Odette said. “Now, I want to sell them all. More sales for me is more money for you and your mom, so yes, let’s be fucking mercenary about this. That’s why I want you kids here. I can sell paintings to people, but you’re the only ones who can sell your father.”
Marianne nodded.
Elliott’s gaze fell on the wedding album. “Thank you. For doing this. For getting John to send Dad’s things.”
“Oh, that wasn’t me. John finds me ‘abrasive and unpleasant.’” Air quotes. Odette huffed. “He barely wanted to deal with me long enough to get the paintings sorted out. It was Lucien who performed this little miracle.”
Elliott looked at Lucien, eyebrows raised.
“I am neither abrasive nor unpleasant,” Lucien said brightly.
Odette huffed and reached for a slice of pizza.
They talked a little while they ate, their memories of Henry and Norland Park tumbling out here and there. Odette told them about the first time she’d met him, about her assumption that someone with the surname Dashwood might be a dilettante at best and nothing but an overinflated ego at worst. And her surprise when she’d discovered a real artist instead.
“He started painting so late,” she said, picking an olive off her slice and flicking it back into the box. “If he hadn’t spent the first thirty years of his life being forced into the box built by the rest of his goddamn family, he could have been phenomenal.”
Elliott glanced over at the boxes and wondered if that was true. If his dad could have been great if only he’d gone to art school instead of business school. If only he’d picked up a paintbrush before he’d met Abby. If only he’d had the time.
When the pizza and beer were finished, Odette and Marianne gathered up the trash and headed downstairs with it.
Elliott found his gaze drawn to the boxes again. He felt Lucien watching him quietly, and pulled his gaze away again. “Thank you. For doing this. For having to deal with them.”
“I happened to have an in,” Lucien said, flushing. “Okay, promise you won’t tell anyone? It’s sort of a secret.”
“Okay,” Elliott said.
“John’s wife,” Lucien said. “Francesca. I’m engaged to her brother.”
Elliott froze. “Her brother?”
Lucien smiled. “I’m engaged to Ned. Ned Ferrars. I have been for three years now.”
“To Ned?” A cold, dark pressure expanded in Elliott’s chest. “You’re engaged to Ned?”
“Oh God, I know!” Lucien laughed. “The whole family’s so awful, but Ned’s not like them, I promise! He’s really kind and wonderful and a total cinnamon roll, really.”
Elliott forced himself to smile.
Forced himself not to react.
Forced himself to breathe
as he listened to Lucien explain how Ned Ferrars was the sweetest guy he’d ever met.
“Elliott, are you okay?” Marianne asked as they entered the apartment.
“Fine,” Elliott said numbly.
It didn’t matter.
Marianne threw him a worried look.
It didn’t matter. Ned hadn’t promised anything. It was just a hookup. Hadn’t Elliott said that all along? It didn’t matter. This sense of . . . of whatever the hell it was, was misplaced. It was all his stupid hope, crushed, but that burden was Elliott’s alone. Elliott had built that hope up out of nothing, and it was his own fault because Ned hadn’t promised anything.
Marianne raised her eyebrows. “Was it the pizza?”
Elliott shrugged. He knew better than to blame his nausea on the pizza and beer. And even while he forced a smile, a part of him marveled at how Marianne couldn’t tell. How was he not transparent as glass in this moment? But that was one thing Elliott had always been good at, wasn’t it? Repressing his feelings.
“Don’t you ever get angry?”
Elliott almost smiled at the memory, something tight and bitter tugging in his chest.
Ned hadn’t promised anything.
There had been nothing to promise.
Just a series of dumb mistakes that had culminated in one frantic, messy moment up against a wet canvas. Just forced proximity. Just Elliott being so unanchored in those days, so confused and numb and in shock still that he’d done something he normally wouldn’t. With a guy who had a fiancé, apparently, but fuck that. That wasn’t Elliott’s fault.
Lucien was so friendly and welcoming that Elliott hated himself right now, but it wasn’t his fault. Ned could have told him. Should have told him. Well, Ned had them both fooled, didn’t he? Elliott and Lucien. Turned out he was just another rich, entitled asshole who thought he could do what he wanted.
If Ned were here now, Elliott would show him just how angry he could get.
Maybe.
Fuck. Who was he kidding? Of course he wouldn’t. He’d be too fucking humiliated to even look at him.
“Do you think you’re coming down with something?” Marianne was still wearing her worried frown.
Elliott drew a deep breath and crossed over to the bed, then sat down heavily and rubbed his hands over his face. “Fuck.”
Marianne sat beside him and rubbed his back in small circles, like their mom did when they were sick. “Elliott?”
“It—” Elliott snorted and sat up. “Sorry. I’m just tired, I think. And seeing Dad’s stuff . . .”
He felt a stab of guilt for using that as an excuse when Marianne’s eyes widened. “I know. God, I know.”
Elliott forced a smile. “A shower will make me feel a lot better.”
“Okay.” Marianne’s worry evaporated when her phone chimed, and she tugged it out of her pocket. A smile lit up her face when she looked at the screen.
Jack.
Elliott escaped to the sanctuary of the bathroom, away from Marianne’s misplaced sympathy and, worse, her happiness. Elliott knew he wouldn’t be able to listen to her prattle on about Jack without it turning into something bitter and jealous inside him, and he didn’t want to be that asshole.
God. It was . . . It hurt. It hurt because he’d liked Ned, and he’d thought Ned liked him too, but it turned out that Elliott was just a fool.
It was only under the hot spray of the shower that the strange truth occurred to him: It hadn’t been John who’d put the photo album in with Henry’s other belongings. It had been Ned.
Somehow the kindness of his gesture just made it hurt more.
***
His first decent bed in weeks, and Elliott couldn’t sleep. He lay awake and listened to Marianne breathe, and watched the play of light and shadow on the ceiling. He hated how Ned Ferrars was so hard to exorcise. Elliott should have been able to do it back in Barton Lake, when Ned had been so cool toward him. Had that been guilt? Elliott hoped so.
“Don’t you ever get angry?” Ned had asked him back at Norland Park.
Yeah. Yeah, Elliott got angry sometimes. Turned out that cheating assholes got him angry, particularly when they’d made him an unknowing accomplice in their shitty behavior. He was tempted to grab his phone and send Ned a text. Tell him exactly how angry he was. Except that was a dumb idea. The dumbest. Because then Ned would know exactly how much he was hurt, and Ned didn’t deserve to know he had that power over Elliott.
It hurt.
It hurt because Ned back at Norland Park had seemed so kind, so genuine. He hadn’t looked at Elliott like he was nothing, like he was an inconvenience. He’d treated Elliott and his grief with respect, or so Elliott had thought. He’d given Elliott a moment of respite, a brief sanctuary from the utter shit-storm that was John and Francesca and the rest of them. Elliott had been so tired of running interference between Abby and the girls and the Family. He hadn’t had to do that with Ned. He hadn’t had to be on his guard.
Or so he’d thought.
It didn’t matter.
What had he thought, anyway? That there was something there? That somehow there was a future in it? With Francesca’s brother? People from families like that, they didn’t welcome people like Elliott. Elliott knew that. He’d known that his entire life. The Ferrars family was no different. And nothing that had happened at Norland Park between him and Ned had been a solid enough foundation to build his stupid hopes on anyway.
This wasn’t heartbreak.
This was the humiliating realization that he’d been stupid, and Elliott could deal with that. He’d dealt with worse, hadn’t he?
He thought of his dad’s things, spread out all over the gallery floor downstairs.
He’d dealt with a lot worse.
***
The Naked Blue Lady arrived in New York a week into Elliott and Marianne’s stay, and Elliott watched anxiously as she was unloaded from the truck and carried inside in layers and layers of protective wrap. Elliott had already seen the mock-ups of the postcards and magnets Odette had ordered. No tote bags, thankfully. Odette had settled on a less confronting piece for those: a landscape that was unlikely to get anyone banned from Whole Foods.
Elliott and Marianne were slowly coming to grips with the contents of the boxes from Norland Park. It felt a little like trying to assemble a jigsaw puzzle with no idea of what they even wanted the final picture to look like. The entire process was emotionally draining. They both took frequent breaks to laugh, or to cry, or to work off their frustration with a walk to the deli and back to get emergency junk food.
Lucien was a constant visitor to the second floor. Sometimes it was to let them know he had to head out for a moment and was locking up. Sometimes it was to remind them to take a break for lunch. Sometimes it was just to chat. He was friendly and warm, and Elliott hated how guilty that made him feel. He hadn’t known, but that was no consolation.
Lucien was excited to take them to the slam poetry place he loved, and was disappointed when Elliott feigned a headache. Marianne went instead, and was back hours later, trying to sneak quietly into the apartment in the darkness, and swearing when she stubbed her toe on the couch.
“How was it?” Elliott asked, reaching out to turn the bedside lamp on.
Marianne shrugged her coat off, and then tugged her knit cap off. She leaned against the couch. “It was really good. You would have liked it, I think.”
Yeah, he really would have liked sitting across from the guy whose fiancé he’d cheated with.
Marianne looked at him. “You are allowed to have fun sometimes you know, Elliott.”
“I know, Mar. I’m just tired.”
Guilty, more like.
It wasn’t just guilt, though. It was sharper, and more bitter, and Elliott didn’t want to think about too closely. It tasted a little like jealousy, and he hated it. He didn’t want to get into another conversation with Lucien about Ned. He didn’t want to hear about how wonderful Ned was, how happy he made Lucien. Not whe
n he’d once cultivated those same stupid hopes. Cultivated them out of thin air, as it turned out, but it didn’t make them any less painful to crush.
Elliott wished his dad were here to give his perspective. His dad had been a cheater too, once upon a time. Not that Henry and Abby had framed their story like that. No. Theirs was a story of fate, of love as unstoppable as a force of nature. Theirs was a story that was so vast, so all-encompassing that there wasn’t any room for the people left behind. For the first Mrs. Dashwood. For John.
Had Henry ever regretted that?
Elliott wished he’d had the courage to ask.
***
Over the next few days, the exhibit slowly took shape around them. Marianne divided her time between working through Henry’s things and flirting with Jack via text. Elliott didn’t have a happy distraction like she did. He became immersed in his dad’s things, picking through them like he was some sort of archaeologist trying to piece together an entire person from only the bones that remained. He tried to ignore the strange disconnect he felt now between the man whose image he was creating for the consumption of strangers, the father he’d loved, and the man who’d caused so much hurt to others in his pursuit of love.
Growing up, John had sometimes come to visit when he was on vacation from his fancy school. Elliott could remember waiting for him, feeling that strange mix of nervousness and guilt. Even at a young age he’d been aware that his relationship with his dad was very different from John’s. That he and John were brothers, but they could never be friends. The age gap was bad enough. The rest was insurmountable. At best John felt like some sort of distant cousin who turned up occasionally, looked unhappy to be there, and then left again.
There was one night . . .
Elliott must have been eight or nine. Henry had been chasing them around, roaring like a dinosaur to make a toddling Greta screech with delight. He’d been wearing his paint-splattered clothes, with a brush tucked carelessly behind one ear. His fingers were claws, and he’d stalked them through the house. Even Elliott had been breathless with laughter.
