Sailing Lessons

by Hannah McKinnon

  She ran the tap until it was good and cold and splashed her face. There was one message on her phone. But it was just Wren: Please call. Important!

  Piper deleted it.

  Staring at her tangled red hair in the mirror, she struggled to recall the night before. Piper had not gone out intending to see Adam; quite the opposite, she’d planned an evening out with her girlfriends, hoping to run into Derek. Some of his Boston Universtiy department faculty often met up for a couple beers after Friday classes.

  Instead, she’d followed her roommate Claire and their friend Hillary into the dimly lit pub and run smack into Adam. He was seated at the bar with a few guys, dressed similarly in crisp shirts and ties, watching a game on the flat-screen. He broke into a smile when he saw her. “Piper!”

  “Adam.”

  Adam had never been good at containing his feelings. It’d been a few months since she called things off with him, and yet here he was just as bighearted as a Labrador retriever. She ordered three beers and tried to focus on the game on television.

  “Want to join us?” Adam introduced her to his colleagues. They’d met at the university last year, but Adam had finished his MBA and now worked downtown.

  She’d gestured over her shoulder. “Thanks, but I’m with some friends.” Piper watched him look past her with curiosity into the crowd, but Adam was predictably too polite to inquire further. She wished the bartender would hurry up.

  Three tall glasses of amber ale arrived and she shoved two twenties across the counter. “Keep the change.” Piper really couldn’t afford to leave the change. But she couldn’t afford to stand there with Adam one second longer either.

  “May I?” Before she could object, Adam stood and collected all three pints. She’d always liked his hands. “Where to?”

  Piper deflated. His chivalry was ruining her good mood. “There.” She pointed to Hillary and Claire, who were waving at them from a corner booth. A booth with plenty of extra room, she noticed with displeasure.

  “Want to join us?” they said, when Adam delivered their drinks.

  Adam glanced at Piper, but she didn’t echo the invitation. “Thanks, but I think I’ll leave you ladies to it. Have a good night.”

  “You, too.” Piper slid into the booth.

  “So that was Adam?” Hillary leaned across the table to clink glasses. “He’s cute.”

  “And still seems interested,” Claire added.

  Piper took a long swallow of beer and relished the cold rush in her throat. “Come on, guys. The past is the past.”

  Hillary leaned in. “How long did you guys date?”

  “Long enough to know he’s a bore.”

  Claire narrowed her eyes. “You mean, long enough to know he’s one of the good ones. Not to mention available.”

  Hillary feigned deep interest in her drink but Claire stared right at her. Piper knew her friends didn’t approve of her new relationship with Derek. It wasn’t undeserved.

  The first time she’d gone to Professor Derek Cane’s office in the English department at BU, it was to recite a poem. Despite the fact that that class was supposed to be an easy elective toward her education degree, she’d gotten a zero on a quiz after sleeping through class after a late night out. Cane had told them at the start of the term that they were allowed one do-over. They had to memorize a piece of work by a poet and recite it. When Piper knocked on his office door, John Donne’s “The Ecstasy” dog-eared in the weighty anthology under her arm, redeeming herself academically had been her only intention.

  The professor’s desk was a mess; stacks of folders flanked a small clearing in the center where he flipped open his laptop, squinting at the screen. He appeared distracted, and she wondered if she’d gotten the time wrong. “Piper Bailey, right?”

  She nodded.

  “Whenever you’re ready,” he’d said, leaning back in his office chair. It creaked, the only other sound in the room beyond her breathing. The formality of the assignment was overshadowed by the intimacy of the office—his desk too close, his gaze too absorbing. She’d not noticed his blue eyes before. Nor the way his dark brows knit together, as they did then when she began. He couldn’t have been more than ten years older than she was.

  She recited the opening stanza too quickly.

  “Breathe,” he interjected.

  Ruffled, she paused and cleared her throat, beginning again. It seemed like forever to get through the next stanza, although she knew every word and every pause by heart. But by the time she got to the next, she’d relaxed into the flow of the language, the rhythm of the lines. She closed her eyes midway through and the rest poured from her mouth in the same mannered way it had when she’d practiced it in front of the bathroom mirror that morning. On the closing line, she opened her eyes, triumphant and relieved.

  Professor Cane nodded indifferently. He opened his ledger and made a note, saying nothing.

  Confused, she retrieved her bag from the couch and started for the door. She’d chosen the longest poem, the most complicated stanzas. She hadn’t missed a single word.

  “Why that one?” he said, finally.

  She paused, her hand on the doorknob. “Excuse me?”

  He looked amused. “It’s a provocative title. An imposing length. What about this poem made you choose it?”

  Something in the air shifted. “It’s not obvious.” She hesitated, wondering if this, too, would be reflected in her grade.

  He waited for her to go on.

  “The language is erotic, coy. The riverbank is ‘like a pillow on the bed.’ It’s also ‘pregnant.’ But it’s more than that. Donne compares the young lovers to planets, their souls leaving their bodies.”

  “Meaning?”

  Here she did not hesitate. “That love is more than physicality. It’s the fusion of the body and the soul. That is what makes them ecstatic.”

  She’d gotten an A. Days later she bumped into the professor at the student center kiosk. He bought her a coffee. Now, five months later, she was sneaking him into her apartment whenever he could get away from home. And hiding the fact that she was desperately in love with him. She’d not thought of Adam Brenner since.

  Claire glanced over at Adam at the bar. Piper saw what she saw. The polished suit. The manners. That easy smile. “I don’t get it Piper; I just don’t get it.”

  Piper sighed and checked her phone. No messages. She tipped her beer back, emptying half the glass. “No one ever does.”

  They ordered another round. Then a pitcher and some tapas. Soon the pub filled, rounding out with the hot din of conversation and the clank of dinnerware. Eventually Piper relented and texted Derek: At the Cambridge Queen’s Head. If he wanted to see her he’d make it happen.

  She tried to focus on the conversation. Hillary had just wrapped up her master’s in education, like Piper, and was interviewing for teaching positions. She had a second interview lined up at her first-choice school in Watertown. “I’m tired of interviewing. I’m so ready for a paycheck.”

  “I’d give anything to trade places,” Claire said. She was working fifty-hour weeks as a graphic designer in an open-office cubicle downtown. She made great money, often lending some to Piper to cover rent, but she loathed her job. Her real complaint tonight was her soon-to-be mother-in-law’s intrusive suggestions concerning her upcoming wedding that fall. “There’s so much still to do. In that vein, we need to get together soon to look at bridesmaid dresses.”

  Hillary pulled up her calendar, but Piper had to try very hard to muster enthusiasm. She adored Claire, but she couldn’t imagine getting married at age twenty-six. Hillary, on the other hand, was not far behind. Unlike Piper, both women had boyfriends’ apartments to go to that night, and as the night wore on Piper prickled at their constant checking of phones and glances at watches. “You coming home tonight?” she asked Claire.

  She shook her head. “I told Dan I’d stay at his place.”

  Piper understood. Their girls’ night was winding down; they wa
nted to go home to their men.

  By midnight Derek had still not responded. Was he tucking in his two kids? Collapsed on the couch with the TV remote and his wife? She ordered another pitcher for the table, and despite Hillary and Claire’s protests she talked them into staying out just a little longer.

  Piper’s last memory was laying down money at the pool table, cue in hand (had she even played?). The room was starting to spin just a little. She’d looked across the crowd to the doorway, which she now understood Derek would not be walking through. Hillary and Claire were ready to go. She should go, too. She let her eyes roam over the crowd one last time. To her surprise, Adam was still there. He was talking to a young woman on the adjacent barstool.

  “We’re going to walk to the T. Are you okay to catch a cab back?” The rush of beer and energy of the night had faded, leaving Piper subdued.

  “All right,” she relented. “Let’s call it a night.”

  They headed to the door together, past Adam. The girl put a hand on his arm, laughed at something he said.

  Piper’s next memory was pushing through the crowd. She lurched up beside Adam, the blonde turning to notice her first.

  “Hey,” she said, tapping Adam roughly on the shoulder. His eyes were a little red and tired. But his smile was immediate. That was one thing about Adam Brenner; he had a great smile.

  “Come on,” Piper said. “Let’s get out of here.”

  • • •

  Now, Piper tugged on her skirt and tiptoed across the hardwood floors of Adam’s bedroom. On the wall hung a Red Sox banner. A small desk in the corner had a picture of the family dog, a black Lab she couldn’t remember the name of, and a pile of law books. And there, under the plaid comforter, Adam’s sleeping form. Piper went over to the bed. She was furious with herself for landing there last night. She knew what it meant to him; what it did not mean to her. But standing there, looking down at his strong profile on the pillow, she felt some small part inside herself soften.

  Outside Adam’s door came a clattering sound of pots and pans from the kitchen. Quickly, she slipped into the hall, ducking out the front door before his roommate could see her. By the time she burst through the lobby doors downstairs, she was almost running, startling a young couple walking up the stoop with a toddler. “Sorry,” she said. She had to get out of there. She had to call Derek.

  Five

  Wren

  Wren ran the pea pods under water in the kitchen sink. Out in the yard, Lucy laughed aloud and instinctively her gaze went to the window. It’d been a long week. Between finalizing the store for its grand opening and staying on top of Lucy’s end-of-the-year school events, Wren had barely been able to catch her breath. There was the kindergarten play, the chorus concert, and the class party she’d completely forgotten she’d volunteered to organize the crafts for back at the beginning of the year on open house night. The classroom mom had called earlier in the week to ask how it was going, and Wren had stammered, “Going great! Can’t wait to share.” She’d at least had the sense to ask, before the woman hung up, “Um, how many kids are there in the class again?” She’d tried not to take the heavy pause on the other end of the line personally.

  There were fourteen students. The craft should account for twenty minutes of activity time. And the theme was “shooting stars.” Whatever that meant. Since then, Wren had driven all the way to Michael’s craft store in Hyannis to fill her shopping cart with glitter paint, sponge brushes, and small wooden cutouts of moons (there hadn’t been a single star between Chatham and Provincetown).

  Every parent knew that this time of year was like riding a careening waterslide right down to the last day of school, and as a single parent Wren was especially sensitive about attendance. This was all on her. As was the Fisherman’s Daughter’s grand opening. This June felt like a tangle of wild Rosa rugosa about to burst open along the dune, a culmination of seasons of work and tending leading up to it. Lucy was just as much in bloom as Wren’s shop. Wren could not afford a misstep with either, no matter what crossed her path in these final weeks. Including an envelope from her long-estranged father.

  Outside, the late afternoon sun was high and bright, and Wren wished her energy level could match it. She kept one eye on Lucy and Badger playing in the yard, the other on the pea pods in the colander. The garden was just beginning to yield, and she longed for the day her windowsill would be lined with its cheerful bounty: tomatoes, zucchini, yellow squash. She opened the window and leaned out. “Lucy! Dinner.”

  There was the scrabble of dog toenails on the ancient hardwood floors and the slap of a screen door. “Ta-da!” Lucy plopped herself into a chair at the table. Badger stood sentinel beside her, nose daringly close to the edge of the table.

  “Hands,” Wren said.

  “But Mom . . .” Lucy held up her palms as Wren set the plate down in front of her.

  “I see chickens. And dog.”

  Lucy narrowed her eyes, but pushed her chair back obediently. “Cannot.”

  “Can too. Now, go wash up.”

  As they ate, Wren watched her six-year-old drag her fork through her mashed potatoes with pleasure. The early summer sun had already colored her limbs peachy from outdoor play. She returned indoors ravenous each afternoon, seemingly growing each day. Lucy popped a pea into her mouth and closed her eyes. “You grew those, you know.”

  “I know.” Lucy looked up from under her row of dark brown bangs. “Do you think Daddy likes peas?”

  Wren swallowed. These kinds of questions were coming with more frequency, but they still caught her in the chest each time. “I’m sure he does,” she said, carefully. James’s dark brown eyes flashed in her mind. The same dark eyes that now watched her from across the table. Wren switched the subject, “Let’s finish up, because I have brownies from Grammy.”

  Wren heaved an internal sigh of relief when Lucy dropped the subject, her six-year-old thoughts turning swiftly to the pan of brownies on the counter.

  This was your choice, she reminded herself whenever her thoughts landed on James. Something that was happening more and more lately.

  From the moment she found out she was pregnant, Wren knew: she wanted this child and she would do whatever it took to raise her. She didn’t need a man beside her to do that. As her mother had told her all her life, “There are things we can do for ourselves.” Why not parent? Wren had had a father as a child, and look how that turned out. If Lucy were raised by her, and her alone, Wren could protect her. She could control who and what came into Lucy’s life. She could keep her safe. If she missed James at all during those first years, it was in the way one misses a coworker. It would have been nice to have someone to share the burden with, someone to lighten the load.

  • • •

  When Lucy was born Wren was launched into motherhood with such primal force she’d been unable to think of anything else. If she were honest, she’d felt betrayed in those first months. Why hadn’t anyone warned her about how hard this was? About the middle-of-the-night feedings, one after the other. About stumbling from darkness into daylight, not knowing what time of day it was but always headed in one direction: to the crib. Lucy was a fitful baby, hungry and colicky. She needed to be held all the time. For hours Wren would nurse and rock her, rising ever so slowly from the chair and inching her way cautiously to the crib. How her back throbbed from leaning over that crib railing, holding Lucy close as she attempted to lower her softly, so softly, to her bed. To no avail! The moment Lucy detected the touch of the mattress beneath her swaddled backside, she arched angrily and began wailing. Defeated, Wren would scoop her up, and back to the rocker they’d go. If ever she thought she would lose her mind, it was during those early months.

  There was no one but her to do it. Sure, Shannon came daily with casseroles and baby clothes and advice. Lindy moved in for a week, and took over household chores, in an attempt to afford Wren a reprieve. Wren wondered if any mother had ever wished to be saved from her own baby, as she did. It was the
worst kind of guilt. No, she had not concerned herself with thoughts of James. She had no thoughts of her own during those first years; survival was all she could aim for.

  Eventually, things got easier as everyone had promised. Wren learned to read her baby, to differentiate between a hunger cry and a hurt cry. That it was all right to tuck Lucy into bed with her so she could steal some sleep. The pull of love that Lucy projected was the one thing Wren was most unprepared for. When Lucy wrapped her tiny fingers around Wren’s own, when she locked eyes on hers, something inside of Wren went still. There was no other person she wanted to be with more, no other place on earth she was needed. This was what it was all about.

  • • •

  But even her bottomless love for her child couldn’t dampen the struggle of single parenting. When the baby awoke howling with hunger in the middle of the night, there was no one beside Wren in the bed to turn to. As Lucy began to crawl and walk, it was Wren who chased her, picked her up, redirected her from stairs and table edges and open doors. Likewise, the sick days and pediatrician appointments were hers alone to bear, just as the baby music classes and library story times were hers to enjoy. The years of single parenting had left Wren wrung out with exhaustion, her sole focus getting the two of them through each day, each milestone, each year. And then it seemed to ease. Too quickly, Lucy was school-aged and independent. She could tie her shoes and write her name, and was very much her own little self. Wren found that she was soaking up these moments rather than wishing them to pass, as she sometimes had. They were a team, and Lucy was her sidekick, her reason for everything. Surely they were enough for each other.

  But lately Wren wasn’t so sure about the decision she made all those years ago. Lucy’s inquisitions about her father rattled Wren’s conviction. They cast a shadow that stretched beyond the limited answers Wren provided. Would Wren and Lucy, just the two of them, still be enough?