The Ocean House

by Mary-Beth Hughes

  The poets had all written letters of support and they were gratified to hear the young widow was doing so well, but she did have one tiny request, since she couldn’t possibly leave Rome now: the stepmother.

  And maybe this is where the story begins. If the younger sister was the terrible middle, and the old poet, seen at long last through the eyes of love, was the end, then this, the poets began to believe—and it frightened them in its starkness—might be the start.

  Who picked her stepmother up at the train station? They all did.

  A huddle of poets, braced against the whipping wind off the icy river, sheltered only by each other’s warmth. The train crept in to a stop. They already felt the escaped curl on the collar. The sexy wisp. As if the old poet had bequeathed them something delicious. Alive. Breathing.

  So they were facing the wrong direction looking up when a single rider disembarked. The stooped woman dragged her roller case right by them. A catch in one wheel, a shriek and a yank. It was too heavy a bag and if the poets thought to help, as they might ordinarily, at the moment they had a higher calling.

  They waited. One poet turned just in time to glimpse the elevator doors closing on the woman in the red knit cap, blowing her nose on a shred of tissue. He looked back up at the stilled train. Waiting. Something was wrong. The idling engine hissed to silence. The reek of creosote filled the air. Inside a crackled announcement. The poets strained forward to hear.

  The train, they heard, was disabled. But everyone should keep their seats. No one was to move. Strange instructions, the poets all thought. But then uniformed police were sweeping over the platform, prying open every door, entering every car by force. And now the poets themselves were pressed for identification.

  What for? Wait. What’s wrong?

  They were herded as one up the stairs and shoved right out of the station. The doors cordoned off behind them. They could scarcely make sense of the horror they felt rising, and more than one poet felt on the verge of tears, real tears. What could they do? What was happening? But they’d already seen the very worst in their imaginations. Many times. They knew. They knew.

  Looking for me? The old woman in the red knit cap, tapping her nose with the tissue shred, sat quite straight now on the stone wall near the paved empty car lot, her heavy bag tipped sideways. Wheels entirely broken. Crushed. Bent. Not going one more turn. Above them the sky went black and starless. Below the train was still. Looking for me? she said again. And they were. And they understood then that they were. That much, so far, seemed obvious.

  California

  Oona wasn’t budging. Her father leaned down for a private conference away from the clutch of mothers on the playground. Oona Claire? he said in a serious whisper.

  She turned her head away and growled but quietly.

  Arthur stood up, stretched his long arms. The school would close its gates soon, and all the mothers were putting away the fruit leather and the juice boxes. Afterschool play was done for the day, but Oona’s love, William, still hadn’t emerged from the building.

  He’s in trouble, said Oona.

  What kind of trouble? said Arthur, sitting back down on the railroad tie bench, waving to the successfully departing parents. His wave said, my life is impossible, and the other parents gave polite smiles. He asked too much was the unstated consensus.

  William hates his cubby, said Oona.

  Okay?

  He really likes music.

  This was a threadbare topic. Oona was good on the rhythm triangle, better than Oona T. She could bang hard enough to get the brrring. Loud!

  Arthur dropped his head between his hands. Then his phone vibrated against his heart. He dug it out to scan. Angie the babysitter was canceling for tonight because of her boyfriend’s cold. Fuck me, he said, then looked around. But the place was deserted except for Oona, who was guarding the path between the door and the gate.

  Come on, beast. Ice cream. Then you put on a dress and we’ll head over to Nathan’s book party.

  Nathan wrote a book?

  Nathan wrote a novel. You know that, Oona. Come on, tushy in the stroller.

  Not this minute, said Oona. A new phrase she was testing. She ambled closer to the school door, letting herself be catchable. A straight run would be an outrage. This way she was still clear of an argument. Cece the play therapist had talked to Oona about defiance and where it led. Lately she and her father were on a better footing, and Cece said Oona’s good attitude was the spark. Cece had big lips with points she liked to color pink.

  There he is! Oona jumped up and down, shouting her father over.

  But Arthur was busy typing a plea to Angie the babysitter to rescue him just once more and he would make it worth her while. Bargaining. Begging. He shook the phone as if he could speed up her response. Oona held herself in a shivering hug.

  Oona? Over here. Now.

  William’s nanny backed out the double doors, angling the stroller so as not to bang his feet. His boots were tied together and flung over the nanny’s shoulder infantry style. He wore red-striped socks and a green eye patch over his left eye. William had been born with a rare ptosis in one eye. His other eye, his mother, Rachel, assured the school, was perfect, in fact superior to most eyes, and her resistance to any kind of special ed track for William was titanic. One afternoon, Arthur had watched Rachel wrestle the head teacher, Miss Sarah, to near tears and felt a familiar jab at the base of his spine. Just where he preferred to ignore it. Shit, he’d said to no one as Rachel made her way swiftly, triumphantly­—­William stumbling behind her—to the town car at the curb. No black SUV for Rachel. The man opening the door wore a cap. When Arthur reported all this to his friend Nathan, there was no need to explain the impact of the scene. Rachel was a movie star.

  Now William’s nanny watched the way out like she was navigating hostile terrain. Oh, Oona, she said. Not today.

  And Oona wanted to know: Why?

  This William, said the nanny. He is in the mood to be home in his room thinking over what he said to Miss Sarah just now. Isn’t that right, William?

  William knocked his head back against the stroller, then yawned.

  Are you tired, William? asked Oona. Bad dreams?

  William looked at Oona and smiled a sleepy tenderness.

  All right, lovebirds, said the nanny. Good day, Oona.

  She wheeled William out of the little playground, while Oona tapped her toes—one, two—then did as graceful a leap as her small pink parka would allow. She was a dancer, just like her mother.

  Tomorrow if William is still in a bad mood? I’ll give him some crayons, Oona said, letting her father strap her into the stroller now. The stroller was a big concession lately brokered by Cece the play therapist. Oona at four could easily outwalk her father. But as long as William used one, Oona wanted one, too. And Cece said maybe the security of the stroller wasn’t a bad idea while the mother was still away from the home.

  Try away from the planet, said Arthur and got a recalibrating smile in return.

  Immediately, Oona confirmed that her mother was in California, which was still on the planet, right?

  Her father said, that’s right. He was sorry. He’d made a mistake. And the next time Cece offered suggestions: regular mealtimes for Oona, a vegetable or two, scheduled weekly communication with the mother, he just nodded. Open. Learning.

  Right now he was learning patience. Plugging then replugging the inscrutable straps into the right sockets on the stroller. His phone vibrated again. He stood up and pressed it to his ear, making the shush sign to Oona.

  Jesus, Angie, you’re my savior. No, that’s perfect. I’ll give you the address and you can pick her up there and then get her some dinner. I’ll be home early. You’ll only miss a sneeze or two. No, no, no, I’m grateful! You’re a rock star.

  This very week at play therapy, Cece had said that sometimes dreams
are like stories and Oona could color her dreams with crayons to read them. So Oona drew a gray squirrel with a pink strawberry hat and said, That’s Mommy coming home.

  Cece said, Very nice. Very nice. Then she asked about the coiled-looking brown cloud at the top. Now, where’s that sunshine hiding?

  A question Oona loved because William’s nanny often said something very similar. Where was her sunshine boy hiding? Where was the lovely sunshine boy she knew? When Oona reported all this to her father—the squirrel, the coil, the excellent sunshine question—he shook his head but kept his mouth shut. They were both trying hard, he finally said. You and me, Oona, giving it the old elbow grease.

  And Oona loved this, too, because elbow grease was how her father got through law school, that and the galvanizing foreboding that her mother would be the expensive kind of love.

  At first, when Oona’s mother had gone to Arizona for just a smidgen of rehabilitation, her father had stayed nearby in a rip-off hotel and tried very hard to help. Then he needed to come home to Oona and to his job. The minute he left, Oona’s spacy aunt Sally, her mother’s older sister, flapped in to assess the situation. She’d found a better, reputable, really medical, really spiritual place in California. So she packed up Oona’s mother and flew her to San Francisco and moved her—just for the moment—into the two-bedroom pool house in Russian Hill. Near family, close to home.

  What about this fucking family? This fucking home? Arthur had said, or something along those lines, questions he would ask again and again. Then he caught the next red-eye.

  If anything, she seemed more gone than ever and that made her tender with him, that and the wide dark-purple sky and the sparkling pool. For one night they nestled in a bed that smelled like fresh bamboo and excellent weed and he whispered into her sleeping ear: Come back.

  But the next Monday morning back in New York her sister, Sally, called him at work to say the visit hadn’t helped. The doctors felt the relationship needed to cool down a tad.

  The doctors said “tad”?

  Then some medical student was cued to join the call for a consultation. The upshot? No more visits. For the time being. And the family would now foot the bills. Going forward, Sally said. As if that settled everything.

  At the time, Arthur told his friend Nathan that rehab is rehab. Either she cleans up or she doesn’t. The Napa Valley didn’t have any special edge. Really she could be doing this in Queens. And that could be the possible next step. After California knocked itself out.

  Outpatient, inpatient. Eventually the pool house became awkward, so an old friend offered a guest cottage in their vineyard. Outpatient, inpatient. Then a cousin had a carriage house he didn’t need for the moment. Inpatient, outpatient, inpatient. Three months, six months, nine months, a year, and so far, Arthur was right about California.

  But at Cece’s suggestion, on Sunday evenings, if her father was home and her mother felt up to it and Oona was quick in her bath, the plan was to Skype her mother. This happened once. Mommy, Daddy pointed out, could be hard to track down.

  But on this special night her mother’s face filled up her father’s computer screen and Oona’s face was in a tiny stamp in the corner.

  Mama? Oona said to the screen.

  Yes, baby? said her mother.

  Do you remember how to get here? Oona knew this had been a problem in the past.

  I always know where you are, kitty cat, said her mother. Then she made a movement outside the screen. Someone in a dim corner in California needed her mother to go rest now. Then the screen blooped dark.

  Is Mommy in trouble?

  Arthur began tapping through Netflix for a treat. Why, sweetheart?

  Going to bed early?

  Mommy’s a little bit sick, remember? He tapped his forehead. It’s in Mommy’s mind. And being with Aunt Sally is like being captured by a poisonous gelatinous space alien.

  Oona’s eyes went wide.

  I’m joking! Joking. Anyway, it makes her very tired, Oona.

  Are you tired, Daddy?

  Oh, just every single minute of every single day.

  And then the room went still. He slid a glance at her.

  Right away, no warning, Oona opened her mouth wide and began to howl. She shrieked.

  Hey! Arthur said. What the hell?

  Oona yelled louder, a weird warbling keen that stung his ears. Stop it! Oona! Cut it out.

  But she couldn’t stop. The more she yelled, the more it was impossible to cut it out.

  Oh my god. Shut up! he said, but she kept going. Louder and louder.

  Even when his hand flew right up in front of her face—so fast, too fast for both of them—even then she couldn’t stop. But he’d caught his hand just in time, and he stayed that way holding his right hand with his left, frozen, until he started to cry, too.

  There was luck in this. And for a half second in some barely known way he understood he hadn’t always been so lucky. He said, Please, please, stop. But he was whispering now, not making any attempt to quiet her. Soon the neighbors would be knocking on the door. The walls were practically rice paper. Who the fuck cared? Really. Who the fuck cared? Shriek away, Oona. Shriek away.

  At last a pause.

  He peeked to see her hand splayed and round on her red wet cheek, patting, patting, patting. Her triangle rhythm, the one William liked best. One, two, three. And.

  Oh, Oona. Oona.

  He kissed the top of her head. Then he stood up to get some water from the kitchen. His in the Mets plastic beer tumbler, hers in the preferred plain green shot glass. He sat back down on the sofa beside her and looked through the computer. His T-shirt smelled filthy even to him. Then he perked up and said, Holy cow!

  When she didn’t respond, he said, Wow. This is fantastic.

  What? Oona finally said. What is, Daddy?

  Only our favorite, he said. Starting this minute! Thus surrendering once again to the magical power of The Searchers.

  Oona didn’t really care for The Searchers. But her father settled his laptop on her mother’s old embroidered meditation cushion. He only liked certain parts of the movie. The things really worth watching. Encore? he’d say after an especially mighty scene.

  At bedtime, as usual, they counted the dopey flat green sheep on her duvet cover. Good, she said. Just like her mother, Oona was quick to forgive.

  And Arthur was trying his best, too. He answered the ritual questions about California and her mother’s imminent return. He put on a friendly face and that’s all that was needed. Goodnight. But they both knew that for him the upset would need to harden in some way then find a release in verbal darts to come. Comments aimed to solidify and eject the misery he now felt only at the base of his throat. Even with the pink T. rex night-light aglow and grape-scented bath soap in the air. Oona’s lips pursed like a cartoon angel in presleep. Goodnight. And still he couldn’t stop the lash of anger but only at his throat, and that was a big improvement.

  Cece the play therapist was all about Oona, but she liked to give Arthur pointers when she felt she could safely lob one in. Stuff about breathing and feeling his body. Her latest? Anger like his didn’t just pack up and go away. Pack up? Anyway, who said he was angry?

  Well. Miss Sarah, the preschool head teacher, for one. Her classroom assistant, Miss Peg. It was the unanimous unspoken consensus of the parents on the playground. His old friend Nathan, occasionally, but like the waiting mothers at dismissal, it didn’t really bother him much. For them it was more a noticeable quality—the whole quivering high-frequency affect—than a problem.

  For Oona’s mother, it had been a problem. One she solved with white wine and Klonopin in the early days. Later, after the baby was born—a tough delivery, an arduous recovery—a new world of opportunity opened up. And with her opportunity came opposition in Arthur. And this opposition, eventually, brought the neighbors k
nocking, sometimes calling through the door, and when that didn’t work, they went down to the lobby and started buzzing. Once they called the police. It was an unfair fight. Oona’s mother could fade away to black at will. And then Arthur was left alone with all that terrible, terrible fury.

  Coursing through the blood, said Cece, as if all fury were identical and biological. She made her hands move like two fish swimming in unison. Feisty fish who may feel good and exciting but created misery and discord wherever they swam in Arthur’s system. His pounding heart? His migraine headaches? His teeth. Naturally, from that moment on, Arthur had his ears open—where the fish were especially seductive—for a new play therapist.

  Early in the new year, it came to light that Oona didn’t like to answer questions in preschool. When Arthur asked her why not, she said it was because she didn’t know the answers. He said she only needed to think a little and the answer would pop into her mind, right behind her eyes.

  Just like in Mommy’s mind?

  Well, everyone has their own kind of mind, sort of. You know that, he said. Let’s practice. What’s your name?

  Oona!

  What’s my name?

  Arthur!

  What’s our best bud’s name?

  Nathan!

  And your play therapist?

  Oona waited. Oona waited a little more, and her father nodded. Oona looked into her mind. Mommy loves me in her heart?

  That’s right, he said. Totally right.

  And they didn’t practice anymore after that.

  In moments of sorrow, weariness, elation, loneliness, and everyday frustration Arthur sometimes still believed that Oona’s mother also loved him in her heart. Late in the night his phone would vibrate and he’d bring it deep under the covers, old covers, same covers, for long talks drenched in impossibility. Sometimes she was the impossible one. But not always, he knew that. He loved, most of all, to hear the first rasp of irritation rise close inside his ear. Her first cracked note. That, then the cool switchback. The barb, the bite, the swift crazy sock of joy. Then it was a race to who could hang up first. Then all the black hours to follow. Pointless, tuneless, exhausted walks to school, to the office. Then one day, she was back in her sister Sally’s pool house, and the calls stopped for good. The account disconnected.