“We’ll see you tomorrow for breakfast?” Bess asked Chris.
“I’ll see what the morning brings,” he replied noncommittally.
Chuck reached out and hugged Chris. “I’m glad you came tonight,” he said. “Really glad.”
“Be careful getting back,” Nathan told him. “There can be an occasional drunken reveler on the road, even in a place as civilized as Kennebunkport.”
Bess watched as Chris rapidly scanned the room, no doubt for a sign of Allison. She couldn’t tell if he was disappointed or relieved by her absence. She alone watched as his car left the driveway and turned onto the road toward town.
She turned back to the room and was aware of murmurings among the friends.
“It went okay, don’t you think?”
“Yeah, sure.”
“You really think so?”
“Nobody shouted or stomped off. That’s usually a sign that things went well.”
“I still wish he hadn’t come.”
“Too late now. He’s here.”
“I hope Allison is okay. She slipped away pretty quickly the moment we all got up from the table.”
“Can you blame her? She probably didn’t want to have to say goodbye to Chris.”
“Yeah. Damn, I’m tired.”
“All that cheese.”
“I was thinking it’s more from witnessing all that pent-up emotion.”
“Possibly.”
“Good night.”
When Bess was alone she began to clear the table. Darn that Annie, she thought, that Scarlett O’Hara, that Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm, and every other fictional heroine who turned her back on an unhappy present and set her face toward what she believed would be a better tomorrow. And darn Sarah Bernhardt, too, going onstage with her one leg! They had set the standards for optimism and a can-do attitude pretty high for people like Bess, who trusted in a world that was welcoming and nurturing and full of joy.
Wearily, Bess loaded the dishwasher. She wished she had asked someone to help her clean up. Too late now.
Chapter 83
“Do you think things will be all right?” Marta asked. Mike was lying beside her in their bed.
“With us?” he asked quietly.
Marta’s stomach dropped. That either of them could be in doubt for even a moment as to the health of their marriage sickened her. “No,” she managed to say. “I meant with Allison and Chris.”
“I have no idea. It will be if they want things to be. And if they don’t . . .” Mike turned on his side, his back to her. His aborted comment lingered in Marta’s head long after he had fallen asleep and she lay there staring into nothingness.
Chapter 84
The evening had been a weirdly disorientating experience. At one point, Allison had felt an almost overwhelming desire to laugh. There they were, all sitting around the table pretending that nothing was wrong and yet all knowing that something was wrong. The sense of dislocation, of brokenness had been palpable; she was sure each and every one of them felt it.
She had said very little; had she said anything at all? Chris had offered nothing new. He had replied to general questions; no one had asked him anything about his personal life. How was the business? (Chris had not mentioned his recent professional coup.) How were his parents? Had his flight been without incident? Was the B and B comfortable? Where is your wedding ring? That was one question no one had asked. Allison looked down at hers, still on her finger.
The moment the first person had begun to get up from his seat, Allison had successfully slipped out of the room unnoticed. She could be forgiven for rudeness. The wine might have mellowed Chris; he might have reached out to hug her. Chris wasn’t particularly demonstrative, but this was such a strange situation that one couldn’t be sure what anyone would do. A touch would have been disastrous. Absolutely disastrous.
“Surely . . . I should not be so mad as to run to him?”
She was not sorry she had disappeared.
She was not sorry.
Chapter 85
At seven thirty that morning Bess received a text from Chris, crying off breakfast. As it happened none of the others seemed interested in breakfast. Of the dozen fresh bagels she had put out, only two had been eaten. The new box of cereal remained unopened. Last night’s meal must have been more filling than Bess had realized.
After her own meager breakfast of coffee and an orange, Bess had busied herself with chores pertaining to the wedding. Guests were arriving in town; Bess had called the hotels where they would be staying to be sure her welcome baskets had arrived. Her dress was hung on the closet door of a small, otherwise unoccupied bedroom. The bouquets would be delivered early the next morning; Bess had confirmed the delivery with the florist. The band was a go; the caterer was ready; the bakery was set to drop off the various wedding cakes and other sweet treats.
Momentarily without anything in particular to do, Bess went to the back porch. The atmosphere was dense with fog; she could barely see the water. Suddenly, a figure appeared at the bottom of the garden. Bess blinked. It was Chris. She was reminded of the day that large gray cat, the one who had subsequently befriended Allison, first appeared in the gnarled branches of the tree as if by magic. Chris waved to her and Bess went to join him.
“Do you know where Allison is?” he asked.
Bess hesitated. She wasn’t sure it would be right to tell Chris where he could find her. She could suggest he text Allison. Allison could respond or not, as she saw fit. But the look of weariness on Chris’s drawn face got to her.
“Probably on the beach,” she blurted. “She goes there a lot on her own. And, Chris?”
“Yes?”
“I’m really sorry about the baby.”
Chris swallowed hard and then headed for the wooden stairs that led to the sand.
Alone, Bess tried to convince herself that she hadn’t done wrong in telling Chris where Allison could be found. But she couldn’t quite pull it off. Allison had a right to her privacy. She had a right to make the decision to meet with Chris or not to meet with him.
Then again, she argued, she could be excused for allowing her emotions to make a decision rather than her brain. In little more than twenty-four hours she would be getting married. She was under a lot of pressure.
But that wasn’t a very good excuse. Bess turned back toward the house. She hoped Allison would forgive her.
Chapter 86
Mike was not in their bed when Marta woke the next morning, dripping with sweat.
She had been dreaming about her children. Sam had announced she was leaving forever and never coming back. Marta had watched from a window as her daughter went running down a dirt road, her hair streaming behind her. Marta had tried to shout, but only a croak emerged from her throat.
Leo kept changing form. One minute he was twelve-year-old Leo and then he was ancient, barely alive, hideous; then he was his namesake lion, blood dripping from his jaws.
Troy had no eyes. While his siblings went wild and ran off, he sat silently in a corner, the upper half of his face a blank.
Marta sat on the edge of the bed and tried to forget the horrible images that had plagued her sleeping mind. The dream had been a warning, it had to have been. How could they bring a child into a home where the parents were estranged? Chaos would ensue. Misery. Loss.
Ordinarily, Marta was not prone to panic. But this was no ordinary situation. She would have to make Mike forgive her. She would forget her ambitions, at least for a few more years. She would have this baby, be happy about it, do anything it took to restore what had been. The status quo of the MacIntosh household.
Briskly, Marta rose, grabbed her robe, and headed for the bathroom down the hall. She couldn’t wait for the wedding to be over. She couldn’t wait to get home and make things right with Mike. Her beloved Mike.
Chapter 87
It seemed the others had already eaten; the dish drainer held several cups and plates, as well as two of the coffeepots. Bess had le
ft a note for her—I hope you slept well, it said. There’s a box of waffles in the freezer and fresh bagels. Allison could hear Mike’s voice in the direction of the back porch, and someone was using a lawn mower around the side of the house; probably Nathan. Allison didn’t want to run into anyone so she quickly drank a cup of coffee and left the house by the front door, eager to get to the beach.
It was a foggy morning. The sun was struggling to be seen through a heavy haze, but already beach enthusiasts had set up camp. Still, Allison found the sense of healthy aloneness she so cherished.
She had been there for twenty minutes or so when something made her turn her head in the direction of the house. Walking toward her over the soft, pale sand was Chris. This morning he was wearing a pair of chinos that hung loose from his thin frame; an open-necked linen shirt remained untucked.
She had thought he might seek her out, especially after she had slipped away the night before without a farewell. She had determined to be kind, to rely on the love she had born him from almost the moment they had met, to respond to his words with sympathy. She was also determined to remember what Marta had said about her, that she had come too far to betray herself.
“Can we talk?” Chris asked, when he was only a few feet away. He removed his sunglasses. There were more wrinkles around his eyes than Allison had remembered.
“Did you come after me?” she asked. “Or is this an accidental meeting?”
Allison’s direct question seemed to surprise Chris. He wouldn’t be used to her being blunt. “No,” he said. “I mean, yes, I came looking for you. I went to the house and Bess told me that you were probably here.”
Allison frowned. So much for loyalty. Why had Bess betrayed her again? Why hadn’t Chris called or texted her directly, asking to meet? Did no one respect that she had agency, that she had a mind of her own?
“We didn’t get to say goodbye last night,” Chris went on.
“I know,” Allison said flatly.
Suddenly, face-to-face with the man who was still legally her husband, Allison felt all of her resolve to be kind and sympathetic take flight, to be swiftly replaced by a blazing anger. For the past two years, she had been living in misery, tormented by guilt and grief, isolated from her dearest friends by a promise extracted from her in a moment of supreme weakness. Right then, she hated Chris for having coerced her into that final round of IVF therapy when he knew she was exhausted and depressed. She hated him for having punished her so badly when their child had died. She hated him for having tracked her down this morning, for forcing his presence upon her. She wanted to see him suffer more than he might already have suffered. She didn’t care if that desire made her a bad person. She didn’t care.
The power of her emotions shocked her. How tightly had she been keeping herself under control? Too tightly.
“What do you want, Chris?” she asked. “You’ve got me here now, so tell me what it is that you want.”
Chris swallowed hard. “I wanted to . . . to see you. To ask if you’re well. To—”
“Ask if I’m well?” Allison interrupted. “Of course, I’m not well. I haven’t been well for a very long time, Chris. Or can’t you tell? What do you see when you look at me? Tell me what you see.”
“I—”
Allison cut him off again. “What you should see—if you had any heart left in you at all—is a wreck of a woman. But I’m coming alive again, Chris. I’m coming back to myself.”
“I’m glad. I mean . . .”
“You suggested I was hoping for a miscarriage to end the pregnancy,” Allison went on. “Do you have any idea what that accusation did to me?”
Chris flinched. “That was cruel. I’ll never forgive myself for saying that, or for thinking it. I was crazy with grief. Maybe just plain crazy. Allison, I wish I could take back every hurtful, mean, horrible thing I said, erase it from memory, yours as well as mine. But I can’t. What I can do, what I have been doing, is figure out why I said such things, why I suspected you of terrible thoughts and behaviors, and promise never, ever again to be the person I was back then.”
“That’s a tall order,” Allison said dryly.
“I know,” Chris admitted. “But I mean to keep at it for however long it takes.”
Allison turned to the horizon. It spoke to her of possibility. It gave her hope. She turned back to Chris. “I don’t want to be with someone who’s always struggling to believe the best of me,” she said calmly, evenly. “So, I don’t think there’s any point in continuing this conversation.”
Chris looked as if he was going to be physically ill. “I’m sorry,” he said. His voice was barely audible. “I can’t tell you how sorry I am. I’m asking for your forgiveness but . . . but I don’t believe I deserve it.”
She watched for a moment as he turned away and began to walk, head bowed, hands hanging at his sides. She did not allow his forlorn figure to touch those old wellsprings of kindness and concern.
She felt no regret for what she had said.
She looked down at her left hand, the one that wore the ring Chris had given her so long ago. Always mine. The ring slipped off easily and for a moment, but only a moment, Allison saw herself stride down to the water’s edge and throw the ring as far she could into the blue waters of the Atlantic. Instead, she stowed the ring in a zippered compartment of her camera bag. She had stood up to Chris; she was finally ready to move on with her life.
But she still loved him. She still loved him. That was okay.
Allison straightened her shoulders and realized she was alone on the stretch of sand but for the strutting seagulls and the tiny little birds scurrying along the water’s edge.
It felt okay, being alone. Maybe not as okay as it had felt standing side by side with Chris all those years.
But it felt okay.
Chapter 88
“Have you given the idea of Stockholm any thought?” Nathan asked. He and Bess were in the den. Nathan had made the small couch his workstation, leaving Bess the desk at which to sit with her laptop.
“No,” Bess admitted, turning to face him. “I haven’t. I’ve been focusing on the last-minute wedding details and worrying about Chris and Allison and—”
“There’s no need to explain or to apologize,” Nathan said, firmly. “We’ll talk seriously after the wedding, once everyone has gone home. I’m sorry I brought it up, really.”
“I love you so very much,” Bess told him.
“I know.” Nathan smiled. “And I’m very grateful for it.”
Bess sighed, got up from her desk chair, and went to sit next to Nathan on the couch. “I might have done something stupid again,” she admitted.
“You never do anything stupid,” Nathan protested.
“Be that as it may, I sent Chris after Allison this morning. He came by the house and asked if I knew where she was and I told him.”
“And do you know if he found her?” Nathan asked.
“Not for sure, but I suspect he did.”
“Don’t beat yourself up. Allison and Chris’s future is up to them, not you. Right now, you are the most important person in your life.” Nathan grinned. “Along with me, I hope.”
“It feels weird to put myself before others,” Bess admitted. “I’m not sure I’m any good at it.”
Nathan put his arm around Bess and she nestled into him. How good it felt to have someone with whom she could share the good and the not-so-good parts of her. “This is a happy moment,” she said.
“There’ll be many more like it,” Nathan assured her. “I promise.”
Chapter 89
A depression of spirits had given way to an unpleasant bout of nervous energy. Marta had used that energy to walk the few miles into downtown Kennebunkport. The streets were busy, but she was only vaguely aware of her fellow tourists, from the well-heeled men and women wearing yellow slacks printed with tiny pink fish and the women carrying designer handbags, to the more casual tourists sporting baseball caps and T-shirts declaring their a
llegiance to the Boston Red Sox.
She was, however, acutely aware of the children. So many young women pushing strollers containing infants! So many young men holding the hands of toddlers! What did a good stroller cost these days? They had been expensive enough seven years ago when she had needed one for Troy.
Marta was already considering heading back to Driftwood House when she saw Chris standing on the dock across the way, looking out over the leisure boats at rest in the water. There was something about the set of his shoulders, something sad that made her go to him without hesitation. That powerful maternal instinct, the impulse to offer comfort to someone in distress.
“Hi,” she said.
“Hi,” he said, managing a smile.
“Been standing here long?”
Chris shrugged. “A while I guess.”
“You spoke with Allison this morning, didn’t you?” Marta asked shrewdly.
If Chris was surprised by her question he hid that surprise. “Yes, Bess told me she had gone down to the beach. I wanted to talk. I wanted to apologize.” Chris looked out again over the water. “She was so angry. I’d never seen her so angry.”
Marta noted again the lines around Chris’s mouth, the pronounced cheekbones, the dark hollows under his eyes. The divorce was draining him badly.
“I’ve let her down twice now,” he said suddenly, fiercely.
Marta sighed. “Chris, forget that night. It’s in the long-distant past. It has no bearing on the present moment, and the present moment is what you need to focus on.”
Chris raised an eyebrow. “My therapist tells me the same thing. Right after he tells me the root of my issues lies in the past.”
Marta smiled wryly. “Your brother?”
Chris nodded and Marta was overcome by a deep compassion for her old friend. Life wasn’t easy and no one acted perfectly at all times. Judgment should be reserved for only the most horrible cases of misbehavior, rapes and murders and child abuse. What did she really know about Chris’s struggles after the death of his younger brother?
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