Heartbroken

by Lisa Unger

  “Stop,” she screamed. “Stop!”

  Brad was still, blood gushing from a cut on his face. Dean panted, chest heaving. “Did he hurt you?” he said through his labored breaths.

  “I’m okay,” she said, but she didn’t recognize the sound of her own voice. Her jaw ached; it would probably start to swell and bruise.

  Brad issued a low moan but stayed still.

  “Ah, God,” said Dean. He put his head in his hands. “We are so massively screwed. So deeply, totally fucked. Em, what are we going to do?”

  Even though she was almost sick with anger for him and for herself, she wrapped her arms around him and held on hard. She buried her face in his neck, grabbed the soft cotton of his shirt with her fingers. She felt like she was drowning and clung to him. Brad’s words were ringing in her head. Was it true what he had said about her?

  “Where’s the money?” she asked. The question seemed to come from outside herself.

  “Under the seat in the car.”

  “And the gun?” she asked. “Same place?”

  He nodded slowly. Emily recognized it as another of those moments. They could go back now, turn themselves in. Brad had been neutralized as a threat for the moment. He was the triggerman holding the gun that had injured Carol and killed Angelo. They were accomplices, but hadn’t they been acting under duress? Wouldn’t there be some way to explain what had happened? How everything had spun out of control?

  The door to the motel room stood ajar; a thin line of light shone into the room. Her head felt heavy, hungover from whatever Dean had given her. The light looked like a beacon. If she moved toward it, she’d be safe. There would be hell to pay, but she’d survive it.

  “I can’t go back to jail,” Dean said, as though reading her thoughts. She didn’t say anything. “But you could go back,” he went on. “You’ve never done anything bad, Emily. We forced you to do this. You tell them that; they’ll believe you.”

  She leaned against the wall, keeping her eyes on Brad, who hadn’t moved. She wondered if he was dead. She didn’t dare get close enough to him to check. She could feel the ache of his hands on her body, his teeth on her neck. She hoped he was dead. Dead and already on his way to hell.

  She didn’t know how long they both sat there, lost in their own dark thoughts. Then Brad issued a low groan, and Dean’s gaze fell on the other man. Brad tried to rise, lifting one hand and shoulder, but fell back to the ground. He wasn’t getting up anytime soon. Maybe never, Emily thought hopefully.

  Then she had another thought. That they should smother him and make sure of it. She looked over at the pillows on the bed and imagined herself taking one and using it, leaning all her weight on his face, feeling him convulse and kick beneath her until all the life drained from him.

  “Emily,” said Dean. He was looking at her with frightened eyes. “What are you thinking? You don’t even look like yourself.”

  Emily shook off the image and rose, started to gather her things: her bag, her cell phone, which had died hours ago. She walked into the bathroom and stared at her reflection. Even though she was wearing fresh clothes, she was filthy with blood. It was in her hair, in the crease of her nose, under her nails. She took a few minutes to wash, leaving the stained washcloth and towels in the sink. She couldn’t get the blood out from under her nails.

  When she returned to him, Dean leaned against the wall, as if drained of all his energy. “We need supplies,” she said.

  “I got all that. It’s in the car,” he said. Then, “I’m sorry I left you alone with him.”

  There were so many things to be sorry for now, she couldn’t imagine why he’d chosen that. “Let’s go,” she said.

  “Where?” he said. He looked at her uncertainly. “I can’t go back, Emily. I can’t do any more hard time. I won’t make it.”

  He looked like a boy sitting there. He’d cleaned himself up, had on a new shirt. His blond hair was cut close, darker stubble on his face. He had these clear blue eyes that always managed to look young and innocent.

  “I know a place,” she said.

  He looked away from her. “You go back,” he said. He got to his feet and came toward her. “I’ll drop you somewhere, and you call the police. Tell them we let you go.”

  He put his hands on her shoulders, pulled her in to him. She rested her weight against him. What was there to go back to? She’d have to face the shame of the terrible things she’d been a part of. Even if she didn’t go to jail, she’d have to move back in with her mother, who’d told her—promised her—it would all go bad. Emily had dropped out of school. She had no job. As sorry and pathetic as he was, all she had was Dean.

  “I won’t leave you,” she said. She hated herself, her own weakness and desperation.

  Dean put his hands to her face, pushed the hair back from her eyes. “I’m going to make this up to you,” he said. “You’ll see.”

  She could tell by the earnest look on his face that he really believed he could do that. If it weren’t so tragic, she might have laughed.

  chapter sixteen

  Every time I arrived at the marina, I was filled with a giddy rush of excitement. I knew the weeks before me were a sunny stretch of sleeping in and cool swims, picnics, and card games. There’d be late nights, camping trips, ghost stories, and flashlight tag. School and all its requirements and restrictions were a distant dream. We’d race from the car to the waiting cuddy, with Mother calling us back to help unload the car and begging us to watch our steps on the floating dock. One year Gene fell into the drink and got such a chill that he had a cold all summer. Anyway, that’s how I remember it. Gene, to this day, claimed that Birdie tripped him. She, of course, denies it. Of the two of them, I never know whom to believe, even now, when all those childish things ought to have been put aside.

  And then we’d all pile in the boat, Daddy at the helm, Mother with her hand on his shoulder. All of us in the bow, life vests fastened. How she came alive as the island approached! All the tired tension in her face seemed to lift; a certain smile found its home in her lips and would stay there all summer. It wasn’t that she ever seemed unhappy back at home. She just felt that she only truly belonged on Heart Island, that the cells in her body longed for it. For Mother, every summer was a homecoming, a return to her true nature. New York City robbed her of something. Heart Island recharged her. It invigorated all of us. We were all different there.

  Kate had spent so much time with her aunt Caroline’s journal that she knew whole passages by heart. And these words were in her head as she, Chelsea, and Lulu pulled into the marina and found a place to park, even though she didn’t share any of her aunt’s feelings.

  “We are seriously in the middle of nowhere,” said Lulu. She pushed her way out of the SUV. She sounded a little nervous, looked anxiously down toward the water.

  “I told you, Lulu,” said Chelsea. She stretched her arms high over her head, turned a playful smile on her friend. “Not a decent mall for hours.”

  “My cell phone isn’t working.” Lulu held the phone up to Chelsea, whose smile widened.

  “Service is spotty,” said Kate. “Supposedly it’s fairly good on the island now.”

  She acknowledged a low-grade buzz of anxiety, a kind of simmering tension that always preceded a visit with her mother. Would her mother comment on her weight or her outfit? Make some quip about the gray in Kate’s hair or the fact that it was too long? You never did have the face for long hair, Kate, she insisted. In pictures of herself as a child, her hair was always boyishly short, unevenly chopped. Kate remembered screaming matches when Birdie forced her to have it cut or permed into short, tight curls when Kate wanted it long. As soon as Kate was out from under Birdie, she’d let her hair grow long, as long she’d always wanted it. Oh, Katie, Caroline had said. You look just like your grandma Lana. She had glorious hair like yours. Kate had always felt safe with Caroline, at ease—the way she imagined some people felt with their mothers.

  “Mom,” said Chelse
a. Kate realized she was standing at the car trunk, zoning out while Chelsea and Lulu waited for her to open it so that they could start unloading. She took a deep breath. Here, the air was fresh and wet. It smelled green. The marina was surrounded by tall trees—pine, sycamore, maple—the swell of low mountains, the foothills of the Adirondacks. A heavy quiet amplified every clanging halyard, the lapping water, the approach of a boat, the crunch of gravel beneath her feet. She opened the trunk.

  As Chelsea and Lulu unloaded their suitcases, Kate watched the boat approach the dock, Birdie at the helm. Her mother was, as ever, perfectly outfitted for her environment. A bright red all-weather jacket, cropped white pants, navy Top-Siders. Her frosted blond hair (dyed, of course; no one could remember Birdie’s natural color, and she would never tell) was clipped into a smart pixie cut (no fuss, no muss). Her handsome face was a landscape of deep lines. She refused to go under the knife for vanity, one point at least on which Kate and she agreed.

  Birdie looked well, as always. She was impossibly slender and unmistakably wealthy. She charged up the dock toward them. She lifted her hand in a wave, wore that tight smile Kate knew so well. She would not be happy to see Lulu. Kate didn’t care. There was something about Lulu that comforted Kate. She found the girl’s aura of absolute self-assurance, her impenetrable cockiness (even if it was partly an act) in the face of Birdie’s disdain, admirable to the point of being inspirational. There was so much to learn from this generation of girls.

  Chelsea ran to her grandmother, and Birdie took her in a close embrace. For whatever reason, Birdie was very affectionate with Kate’s children, though she hadn’t been with her own. Kate thought it represented some kind of personal growth for her mother. Or maybe it was because Birdie’s self-esteem wasn’t tied up in her grandchildren. She didn’t see them as a poor reflection of herself.

  “Hello, darling,” Birdie said, approaching Kate and planting a perfunctory kiss on her cheek.

  “Hi, Mom,” said Kate. She closed the trunk and bent to lift one of the suitcases so she didn’t have to endure her mother’s appraising gaze.

  “You’re looking well, dear,” said Birdie. “Not as broad in the beam.”

  “Uh, thank you, Mother,” said Kate.

  She watched Chelsea and Lulu exchange a wide-eyed look. Lulu started to cough and Chelsea to laugh. It took an expert to hear Lulu conceal the word “bitch” in her fake hacking.

  Birdie’s face froze when her eyes fell on Lulu. “Well,” she said, narrowing her eyes. “This is a surprise.”

  Kate filled her mother in on the fact that Sean and Brendan would be late and that they’d invited Lulu to join them. “I thought the girls could sleep in the bunkhouse,” she said. “When Sean and Brendan get here, the boys can share the guesthouse with me.”

  Birdie frowned. “It would have been nice if you’d let me know. The bunkhouse hasn’t been used for anything but storage. It’s not suitable for guests at the moment.”

  “I tried to call you,” Kate said. “In fact, I’ve been trying to call you since Friday night. We’ll make it work.”

  “Well,” said Birdie. “The phone’s been down.”

  “Since when?”

  “For days.” Kate could always tell when Birdie was lying. “Well, since late last night.”

  “Hi, Mrs. Burke!” said Lulu with exaggerated enthusiasm. “Can I call you Grandma?”

  “You may not,” said Birdie.

  Chelsea and Lulu dissolved into giggles again, and Birdie looked at them, puzzled as to what could be so funny. She brought a hand up to her throat. “I suppose there’s little to be done about it now. I don’t know what we’ll do about food.”

  “It should all work out, since the boys aren’t here,” said Kate. She tried to keep the annoyance out of her voice—and her heart—but she found it so challenging. Why couldn’t Birdie just go with the flow? “Shouldn’t it?”

  “Don’t worry about it, Grandma,” said Chelsea. She draped an arm around Birdie, gave her a kiss. She was easy with Birdie, light in a way Kate never could be. She saw Birdie’s mouth turn into a reluctant smile. “Lulu doesn’t eat.”

  The four of them brought the suitcases down to the boat and loaded it up. Birdie handed out the life jackets, and they all piled on board. Kate undid the lines.

  “Would you like to captain, Kate?” asked Birdie. There was the hint of a smirk in her voice.

  This was a big bone of contention between them and always had been. Kate didn’t actually like the open water, was uncomfortable around boats. The rocking motion unsettled her; the cuddy especially seemed inherently unstable, though it wasn’t. She could swim, but it wasn’t exactly her favorite activity. Water was silently malicious; it could take you. It could swallow you. It would do so when you were at your most relaxed. One moment you could be floating, peaceful, and the next your lungs would fill with water. All your panic and fight would pass quickly. You’d have no choice but to surrender to its terrible, quiet weight.

  “Sure,” said Kate. She saw surprise and skepticism on her mother’s face. Birdie stepped away from the helm. Kate took her place, easily backing the boat from its slip, then guiding it out of the marina.

  “Well,” said Birdie. “More surprises.”

  She hadn’t expected her mother to be pleased. Birdie was happy with herself only when someone else had failed. But Kate had managed to take those boating classes. She and Chelsea had gone together to a school in Connecticut and were both doing pretty well on the water, having learned navigation, docking, knot tying, and emergency procedures.

  As they pulled from the cove, Kate saw Heart Island looming ahead of them. It looked different to her. She’d made the approach many times, always filled with a riot of emotions. But this was her first time at the helm of the boat that took them there.

  On the dock, she and Birdie unloaded the suitcases as the girls tore, shrieking with pleasure, up the rocks. They should stay and help, thought Kate. But she liked to see them so exuberant, so free. It often seemed that their young lives were lived with a screen before their eyes or while being shuttled endlessly from activity to activity. She liked that this place unfettered them. Even she felt a freedom here she didn’t know anywhere else. She’d sent a text message to Sean on arriving at the marina: The eagle has landed.

  Don’t let her get her claws in, he wrote back. Enjoy what you love, ignore everything else.

  It was sage and simple advice, as always, from her husband. Why was it so hard to follow?

  “Why did Dad leave?” asked Kate.

  Her mother didn’t answer, was staring intently at the main house. “Mom?” Birdie liked to be called Mother and had insisted on Mommy until Kate went to college. It had turned out that Kate could call Birdie Mother only when she was angry.

  “Who knows why your father does the things he does?” asked Birdie. She didn’t have her usual tough tone. Today she sounded sad. It caused Kate to cast her a second glance. Did she look thinner? Frail? She noticed that Birdie’s movements were stiff. Kate wondered if her sciatica was acting up but knew better than to ask. Birdie didn’t like to talk about her physical weaknesses.

  “What are you looking at?” asked Kate. Her mother hadn’t taken her eyes from the house.

  “Nothing,” Birdie said. When she looked back at Kate, she wore a fake smile. “I didn’t sleep well. The storm was brutal.”

  Kate had seen the branches down along the road, one fallen tree, on the way into the marina. The island had that scrubbed-clean look that it usually did after a good rain. Kate remembered how frightening and powerful they’d seemed when she was young. How the thunder boomed and the lightning crackled. They always lost power, and the landline went down right away. She remembered wondering how they would get off if they had to, if lightning struck the house and there was a fire while the waters were rough.

  “I can helm the boat in any storm,” Birdie used to say to ease her fears. “And have.”

  “Yes,” agreed her father. “
The natural disaster has yet to be invented that can defeat your mother.”

  “You never need to be afraid in this place,” Birdie had said. “You are always safe here.”

  Kate had wondered what she meant. They were surrounded by water, frequently cut off from the rest of the world, at the mercy of the weather. Other islands had been decimated by fire, two during Kate’s childhood. But because her mother said so, Kate believed her.

  “You did well with the boat, Katherine,” said Birdie. But her mother wouldn’t meet Kate’s eyes, as though the paying of a compliment pained her.

  “Chelsea and I have been taking lessons,” Kate said.

  “Well,” said Birdie. “About time.”

  Kate rolled her eyes. Together, they hauled the luggage up to the house. Kate made sure to take the heaviest cases and insisted on going back for the second load. Birdie didn’t put up a fight. When she thought Kate wasn’t looking, a hand flew to her back, and she winced in pain. Why did she have to hold everything in? Kate wondered. Why could she never be vulnerable, even with her own daughter? Kate almost said something but then didn’t.

  “Need help, Mom?” asked Chelsea, falling into step beside Kate as she headed back to the dock.

  “Yeah,” said Lulu, behind them. “Let us get the rest.”

  Kate felt that urge to brush them off: No, go play, girls. But she remembered how it felt when she was younger to offer help and be refused. There was always a sense of rebuff from Birdie: You won’t do it right, so I’ll just do it myself. It wasn’t just an intuition on Kate’s part; her mother had said as much a thousand times. There was something controlling about wanting to be the one to do everything, to refuse assistance.

  Yes, Birdie, play the martyr, her father always said. It’s so endearing. Meanwhile, where was he? Always in front of the television or reading a book with his feet up. In her life, Kate had never seen her father touch a dish, wash a floor, or make a bed. Had he just given up long before they were born?