by Nancy Thayer
“But some things can never be returned to the perfect state they were in when they were young,” Lisa said awkwardly.
“And some things get better as they grow old,” Mack said. “Many people, for example, become more beautiful. Softer. So a person wants to sink right into them.”
Lisa couldn’t get her breath.
Mack stopped walking. They were only a block from her house, and on Fair Street many of the homes had not yet been opened for the summer, so only the moonlight illuminated their faces. Mack gently embraced Lisa, turning her to face him. He stared at her for a long moment, his eyes silver in the soft light, and Lisa knew her eyes must look silver, too. He bent and kissed her. The air was very quiet. No cars passed, no dogs barked, even the leaves didn’t rustle on the trees. Mack’s mouth was warm and insistent. Lisa raised her arms around his neck and pulled him closer.
When they broke apart, they were both out of breath.
“I’ll race you to the house,” Mack said.
Lisa let her head fall back as she broke into laughter. At this moment, age did not matter. Desire mattered, and it was overwhelming her, so she took Mack’s hand and pulled him along to her house, both of them laughing.
She’d left one light burning in the living room and the door unlocked—she seldom locked it, here on this small island. They stepped inside and as soon as Mack pushed the door shut, he moved Lisa against the wall. He pressed himself against her, held her wrists in his hands, pulled her arms above her head, and kissed her exposed neck and collarbone and then returned to her mouth. She shook with desire. She brought her arms down and pulled his body even more closely to her. She wanted to crawl inside him, she wanted him to crawl inside her, she needed to be totally with him.
“Let’s go upstairs,” she whispered.
The front door flew open, nearly slamming Mack in the back.
Juliet came inside, and behind her, there was Theo!
“Mom!” Juliet said scoldingly.
“Mom,” Theo said lovingly.
Lisa’s breasts were heaving as powerfully as if they were right out of a romance novel. Her poor senses jammed together. Desire made her heart thud even as it slowly evaporated, and anger at being interrupted at this particular moment battled with joy at seeing her son again. She couldn’t catch her breath to speak.
Mack stepped back as the children, the grown children, entered the hall. He held out his hand to Theo. “Hi. I’m Mack. Remember me?” He nodded at Juliet. “Hello again.”
“Hi,” Theo said, with a smile for Mack. “Nice to see you. You’re Beth Whitney’s dad, right?”
“Right.”
“Could we possibly move out of the hall so we’re not all right on top of each other?” Juliet asked, her voice going falsetto in her strangled attempt to be polite.
“I have to be going,” Mack said. “Working day tomorrow.” He winked at Lisa.
“Thanks, Mack, see you tomorrow,” Lisa said, and suddenly she leaned up and kissed him quickly right on the mouth. She held his gaze for a moment, letting him know what she’d rather be doing.
Really? she thought, as Mack went out the door. She’d rather be in bed with Mack than spend time with her two children?
Yes, she thought guiltily, she would.
Mack left.
“Let’s go to the kitchen,” Lisa said. “I’m sure you’re hungry, Theo.”
Theo slung an affectionate arm over Lisa’s shoulders. “So Mom’s got a boyfriend, hmm?”
“Yes,” Lisa told him, holding her head high. “Yes, I do.” She detached herself from Theo’s arm, walked to the refrigerator, and surveyed the contents. She’d been eating for one for so many months—years!—except when Juliet or Theo came home, which wasn’t often. “Theo, I can make a Western omelet for you. Eggs, cheese, tomato, and onion. Does that sound good?”
“Sounds great, Mom, thanks.” Theo threw himself into a kitchen chair.
“Do you have enough to make me an omelet, too?” Juliet asked, her voice strained.
“Of course,” Lisa replied cheerfully. As she worked, deftly setting the tomato, cheese, and onion on the chopping board, taking all seven eggs left in their little cups in the refrigerator door and settling them in a bowl, she kept her back to her children. “So, Theo,” she said as she worked, “what a surprise! I don’t know when I last had both of my children here together.”
“Yeah, I’m glad to be home,” Theo said. “I had an accident, got slammed by a wave, had a fractured humerus—”
“Oh, Theo!” Lisa turned from the stove. “Darling, so that’s why you’re wearing a sling! How do you feel now?”
“It’s nothing, Mom, really. I probably don’t even need the sling anymore. I just use it to remind myself to go carefully.”
“Poor guy. That must have hurt. Were you frightened? Under all that water? You’ll have to tell me about it sometime.”
“I know I don’t want to do that again.” Theo was rubbing his arm, almost proudly. “I’m kind of off surfing. For a while, at least.” He cleared his throat. “I thought maybe I could spend the summer here, get a job, make some money, decide what to do.”
Lisa slowly poured the egg mixture into the cast-iron skillet hissing with hot butter. She lowered the heat, waited a few moments, then added the chopped cheese and veggies. She was glad to have something to focus on, something nurturing to her son, because her immediate reaction, to her own surprise, was certainly not unfettered joy at Theo’s news. And it wasn’t, she mused, only that it would make it difficult for her to be alone in the house with Mack. It was also the knowledge that Theo, being Theo, would expect her to do his laundry, buy his groceries, and cook his meals, as she was doing now.
But maybe this was a good thing. Maybe this was fate’s way of pulling Lisa away from what Juliet considered a disastrous affair. The eggs were done. Lisa hefted the skillet to slide the omelets onto two plates.
“I’m thinking I’ll stay here for the summer, too,” Juliet said.
Lisa almost dropped the skillet. “You’re sure?”
“Well, don’t go overboard with the enthusiasm,” Juliet snapped.
Lisa ignored her daughter’s mood. She knew her children loved each other but most often Juliet acted like a green-eyed cat, jealous of her brother.
“Here we go,” Lisa said to Theo. “Do you want some juice?”
“Mom,” Theo said, “I want a beer.”
“Me, too,” Juliet echoed.
Lisa set the plates in front of her children. “And will there be anything else, sir and madam?” she said, half-jokingly, half-sarcastically.
Juliet stood up. “I’ll get the beers, Theo. You get the silverware.” Before Theo could respond, she said, “I know you hurt your arm, but I’m sure you can carry two forks.”
Lisa poured herself a glass of wine and settled at the table. Juliet sat at one end, Theo on the other, so she had to turn her head to study her children. Oh, they were so beautiful. Even now, it gave Lisa such a deep, primal pleasure to watch them eating.
“So, Juliet, you decided your job will allow you to be here for the summer?”
“Of course. I’ll go back every now and then for a face meeting.”
“Ah.” Lisa turned toward her son. “And, Theo, I’m sure your employer will be missing you out in California.”
Theo talked with his mouth full. “Haven’t worked for six weeks. Because of my arm. Plus I was bartending and giving surf lessons. Lots of guys can take my place.”
Lisa nodded. So when will I have private time with Mack? she wanted to ask. Instead, she said, “It will be wonderful to have you both here. But you know, I have my shop to run, and summer’s always the busiest time, so I’ll need you to pitch in and help me with the chores. Like buying groceries, cooking, and doing your own laundry. That sort of thing.”
“Sure,” Juliet
said. “I do it all for myself in Cambridge.”
“Do you think you’ll get a job here?” Lisa asked her son.
“I want to give myself another week to rest my arm,” Theo said. “Just traveling back from California wiped me out. I mean, not just my arm was hurt, but my entire body, and my head took quite a knock—”
Juliet interrupted. “Oh, come off it, Theo. That was six weeks ago. Don’t be a baby.”
“It’s early in the season,” Theo said reasonably. “I’ll look for a job this week. But give me a break, okay?” Before anyone could respond, Theo stood up. “This was delicious, Mom. Thanks. But hey, I think I’d like a couple pieces of toast.” He walked to the bread drawer and took out a loaf. “Would you like some, too, Juliet?”
Juliet hesitated. She knew she’d been outplayed. “Yes, please.”
Theo made putting the bread into the four-slot toaster using only one arm an Oscar-worthy act of courage and skill. Lisa wanted to applaud, but he’d only just arrived home. She would humor him. He put two pieces on a plate and brought it to Juliet, and set the butter dish in front of her.
“You good, Mom?” he asked.
Lisa smiled at her son. “I’m fine, thanks.”
And I really am, she thought.
thirteen
Why did someone else’s cooking always taste better than his own? Theo finished his toast and wanted to lick his plate.
“I’ve got to get some sleep,” his mom said, rising from the table. “First, let me show you what Mack’s doing on the house.”
“I’ll tidy the kitchen,” Juliet said. She smirked at Theo.
Theo smirked back and followed his mom. The downstairs rooms were all weird, either the furniture moved or covered in drop cloths. He only half listened to his mother describe the cracks in the ceilings, the bizarre plaster stilts, the dust, and a zillion minor problems. The loose panes on the tops of the inner doors that his mom had, she said laughingly, making it a humorous tale, tried to fix herself. The scuffed floorboards, the worn rugs, the ancient wooden kitchen floor. The broken dishwasher—it was easy, Lisa had said, doing dishes for only one person.
His mom’s bedroom had changed. Once in sixth grade he’d done a really cool, if he said so himself and he did, painting of himself, Juliet, and his mom. His mom had loved it so much she’d framed it and hung it on the wall across from her bed. While he was gone, she’d taken it down and replaced it with a large flat-screen television. The thought of his poor mom lying in bed watching television all alone made him oddly melancholy. Plus, didn’t she like his painting anymore? He didn’t see it anywhere.
He entered his room, which he’d held in his mind as a kind of private shrine. And found mountains of clutter. Clutter that wasn’t his.
“I’m going to turn your room into a guest room slash crafts room,” his mother told him.
Theo stood in his room, gawking. His bed was there, more neatly made up than he’d ever had it. Still, there were his chest of drawers, his desk, his desk chair, his shelves of books, trophies, games, and balls. But his posters of the Foo Fighters and Britney Spears in not much more than fringe had been taken down. And cardboard boxes—so many of them!—were piled in the room. On top of his desk. In the corner. At the end of his bed.
“Whoa,” Theo said. “That’s radical.”
“Why is it radical?” Juliet demanded, coming up the stairs. Juliet always wanted to be the favorite, and she never would be, Theo thought smugly. “You haven’t even been home for years.”
“Yeah, well, I’m here now,” Theo shot back.
“Good night, sweetiepies,” his mom said, kissing him and Juliet on the cheek before disappearing into her room and firmly shutting the door.
“Good night, sweetiepie,” Juliet echoed over her shoulder at Theo as she went to her own room.
In his room, Theo moved the boxes around, kind of noisily, as if he wanted to kick them out into the hall. He expected his mom to stick her head in the door and tell him they’d move the boxes somewhere else tomorrow, but she didn’t. He brushed his teeth in the bathroom he shared with Juliet, who’d left one hundred cosmetic items on her side of the sink. He shut his door, got into bed, and immediately felt at home.
The mattress had a trough in the middle. He was torn between being grateful that it was there, one thing that held his mark, and being pissed off that such an old, lumpy, and undoubtedly stained mattress hadn’t been replaced.
This mattress had seen a lot of action. The memories made him smile. He’d hated being a teenager, unable to have power over anything in his life, but he’d had quite a bit of power over high school girls and footballs.
Well, every girl except the girl he wanted most. Beth Whitney. She had been all about Atticus, and when the three of them were together, Beth never even looked at Theo.
That had been hard. High school had been hard.
Every day he’d wakened to an anger simmering deep in his chest. Anger at his mother for letting them live like they did, driving an old sedan, not even four-wheel drive, it was embarrassing. His mother had insisted on teaching him to drive, and sometimes he’d wanted to howl at her. He knew how to drive a car, his high school friends had taught him out on the dirt roads in the moors. His mother was so not fun when she gave him lessons. If he’d had a father, a guy to teach him to drive—and all the other things a father could have taught him—that would have been fun.
Theo kind of remembered his father. A shade, a shadow, tall and broad and handsome. Theo’s mom always said, “I’m so glad you’re a big gorgeous guy like your father.”
She was always saying nice things about his father, this man who hadn’t seen him at all since Theo was a little kid. So many times he’d wished his father was dead. A lot of times, when people asked, Theo told them his father was dead. Then he’d put on a sad face and look at the ground and refuse to talk about it anymore.
Why had his mom never cursed his father, wept with hatred? She probably thought that in some twisted way she was protecting him. But Theo knew plenty of guys in school whose father had moved away, divorced, that stuff. He’d seen a mom throwing dishes in a fit of anger at her ex-husband.
Jeez, he was getting totally morbid lying here like this, where old memories drifted out of the walls to haunt him.
He needed something. Something to ease the pain. He’d brought some oxy with him from California, in case his arm went bad again, but this pain wasn’t physical.
He reached under his mattress to see if the porn magazine was still there. That would cheer him up. He felt the flutter of paper and pulled out Golf magazine. He’d always hated golf, it was boring. How did this mag get here, in his room, under his mattress?
His mom, he realized. His mom had played a trick on him. Which meant she’d known he’d be back home someday.
He heaved out a large breath and lay back on his pillow and looked at the May 2015 cover. A minute later, he was asleep.
fourteen
Beth woke to discover that her father, as usual, had made coffee, left her a note on the refrigerator, and gone off to work. She drank her coffee while she showered and dressed, eager to start her own job. The day was brilliant, warm and bright. Beth walked from her home to the new Ocean Matters office on Easy Street. What a location, right on the waterfront next to the Steamship Authority docks! For a moment, she studied the front of the office. It had a large picture window. She’d find a great poster to put there to lure people in. This space had been an antiques shop years ago, and then a real estate agency. Now it was the Nantucket headquarters for Ocean Matters, and wasn’t that change? Didn’t that show that people were beginning to care about the environment?
She unlocked the door with the shiny brass keys Prudence had given her, along with several folders of documents and a scribbled list of Beth’s duties.
First things first, Beth thought, as s
he surveyed the large room. A desk, two large tables, a computer and printer, and a storage locker had been carelessly brought in, along with several boxes of supplies. The office looked disorganized—well, it was disorganized, but now she was fresh and full of ideas and optimism after her conversation with Prudence. She needed to find someone to build the website. She could work on a draft of the mission statement, and a list of people who should receive an invitation to join Ocean Matters.
Prudence had given her a list of the more environmentally aware people with money who should be at the top of the appeal. But certainly, Beth thought, they needed young people, too, people her age who were optimistic about the future because honestly, they had to be. She typed in a few names. She hadn’t been on the island for years and she’d lost touch with old friends. She was still living in a sort of dream world, transitioning from her life as a graduate student to life back in the town and the house where she’d grown up. She had planned to take a week to renew her familiarity with the island, to spend some time with her father, who must have been so lonely without her. But so quickly she had a job, and one she believed in!
Her fingers were on the keyboard when Ryder strode into the room. She’d met him briefly at the lecture, and she had spoken with him on the phone after Prudence hired her, but he was still new to her, and in a way, larger than life.
“Come with me,” he said without even saying hello. “We’re going out to Cisco. There’s a seal stranded on the beach. Neck caught in a plastic net. The Marine Mammal Stranding Team just phoned. I want to see this. I want you to see it. My island ride is out on the street. We’ll go in that.”
Beth jumped up. She grabbed her phone, her purse, the keys.
“I should lock up.”
“Hurry.”
Beth double-checked the door and raced out to climb into the passenger seat of his Range Rover. Ryder hit the gas the moment she’d shut her door. She clicked on her seatbelt.
They rode up to Washington Street, over Dover, and turned right at Five Corners, heading for Hummock Pond Road.
