August Isle

by Ali Standish

  I suddently remembered how once she had nearly pushed me out of the kitchen doorway. She’d said it was because the kitchen was messy, but it must have been because she didn’t want me to see my and Matty’s names on the wall.

  “Come in, everyone, come in,” she called, taking the pie from my hands. “Make yourselves at home. I’m going to take this pie back to the kitchen. I can’t wait to taste it, Miranda! And I have something for you. It’s in the kitchen. Just hold on while I—”

  But her words faded when she zipped through the door. As the rest of us filed into the house, I heard a familiar squawking.

  “Ladrão! Pega ladrão! Polícia!”

  Beside me, Dad stiffened and tucked me protectively under his arm. “What’s that?”

  “It’s just Mr. Taylor’s parrot, Dad,” I replied. “Relax.”

  “Parrot?” Mom echoed.

  “She’s a hyacinth macaw,” Caleb said knowledgeably. “It’s only, like, the biggest parrot in the world. Be careful of your fingers around her. She can break them like twigs if she gets them into her beak.”

  Caleb snapped an invisible twig over his knee, and Aunt Clare exchanged a look with Uncle Amar.

  “Stop trying to scare them, Caleb,” Sammy said, rolling her eyes.

  We heard a creaking noise upstairs, and Mr. Taylor and Slug appeared on the landing. Mr. Taylor froze there a moment, just as Mom had done at the gates. His thin tuft of hair was slicked back, and he wore a button-down shirt and khaki shorts. Slug scrambled down the stairs, straight into Sammy’s arms.

  “Slug, meet everybody,” she said. “Everybody, this is Slug.”

  But Slug was already flipped onto his back, eyes closing as Sammy stroked his belly.

  Mr. Taylor made his way down the stairs as I pushed to the front of everybody. When he reached the bottom, I wrapped my arms around his back. I held so tightly with my good arm that he let out a small chuckle. “Quite the grip you’ve got,” he said.

  I took it as a compliment.

  “You saved my life. I never said thank you.”

  “And you never need to,” Mr. Taylor said, squeezing me back.

  “What do I call you now?” I asked. “I can’t keep calling you Mr. Taylor.”

  I didn’t want to say it, because it felt mean, but “grandpa” didn’t feel right either. Not yet.

  “How about just plain old Taylor?” he said.

  “Yeah,” I agreed. “Taylor.”

  When I finally pulled away, his eyes fell on Mom. “Hullo, Beth,” he said. His cheeks had gone pink as the inside of a seashell.

  “Hi, Dad,” she said, reaching out for a handshake just as he opened his arms for a hug. I realized it was the first time I had heard her call him “Dad.”

  “Oh,” they both muttered. “Sorry.”

  Finally they settled on a one-armed embrace.

  As she entered the living room, Mom gasped. “Mom’s paintings are exactly where she left them,” she said quietly.

  “Grandma painted these?” I asked.

  Mom held her finger out to the painting above the mantel and gently stroked the blue brush marks of the sea.

  “She did,” Taylor said. “And yes, I kept them just where she wanted them.”

  “They’re really good,” I said.

  “She was a very talented woman,” Mom replied.

  “Do you think—” I started. “Do you think you could tell me about her sometime? I want to know more about her. About all of them.”

  I wanted to see pictures and hear stories about the time Grandma burned the turkey or Matty took his first steps.

  Mom glanced at Taylor. “I think we can arrange that,” she said. “But only if your grandfather agrees to help.”

  There was something else I wanted to know—what had happened to Matty’s mother. My aunt. But I wasn’t ready to ask just yet.

  I really, really hoped she had found a way to be happy again, maybe with a new family. But I didn’t know if I could handle it if I found out she hadn’t. Because even if no one else blamed me for what had happened to Matty and Ben, I still heard the voice of guilt in my head when I thought about them drowning. The one that said: It was all your fault.

  I was trying not to listen to it, like Taylor said. But it was going to take me a while to learn to tune it out completely.

  One day, I knew, I would be brave enough to ask about her. But I decided it was okay if that day wasn’t today.

  Betsy burst back through the kitchen door then, holding covered dishes in both hands as she swept into the dining room. When she returned, she dug her hand into the pocket of her apron.

  “Ta-da!” she said, producing a yellow ribbon and handing it to me.

  “What’s this?” I asked.

  Betsy clucked her teeth. “What do you think it is, silly? The judges said it was absolutely mouthwatering. They wanted the recipe for themselves.”

  I took the ribbon and gazed down at it. In shiny letters, it read:

  105TH ANNUAL

  August Isle Pie-Baking Competition

  THIRD PLACE

  “I won third place?” I asked.

  “You won third place!” Sammy exclaimed, jumping up and down. “I forgot to tell you because of everything else.”

  “What did you win?” Mom asked, looking from the ribbon to Betsy.

  “The pie competition,” Betsy said. “Didn’t Miranda tell you she was entering? You must have done an excellent job teaching her to bake.”

  Mom shifted from one foot to the other. “No,” she said. “Miranda did that all on her own.”

  “Aunt Clare helped me,” I said, beaming at her.

  Sammy’s mom held her palms up. “You baked that pie all by yourself. That ribbon is yours and yours alone.”

  My fingers ran along each of its smooth tails. I had never won a ribbon for anything before. I was already thinking of where I could hang it in my room.

  “Did you win first place?” I asked Betsy.

  She shook her head. “Didn’t get around to entering,” she said. “As you saw, Mama’s not been well. She wanted to come tonight, but I didn’t think she was strong enough for it. She would have loved to see you two girls together, though. She would have liked to know that you were still friends.”

  Betsy was looking at Mom and Aunt Clare. Sammy and I glanced at each other. Betsy’s mom had seen our moms together, in a way. Or at least she thought she had. She’d seen them in us. “Don’t worry,” Sammy said. “I think she knows.”

  The adults looked at her questioningly, but she went back to scratching Slug.

  “I’m sorry about your mother, Betsy,” Mom said.

  Betsy nodded, her chin dimpling. “She’s lived a full life,” she said. “It’s the natural way of things. Still, we always wish we had more time together, don’t we?”

  52

  Everyone was starving by the time we all sat down at the dining table. Betsy had made pork chops and biscuits, something called fried okra, and something called pimento cheese, as well as green beans and applesauce.

  For a while, people were too busy eating to talk much, other than to ask someone to pass the biscuits. Mostly we communicated in gazes and glances.

  Every time she sat down, Betsy would notice an empty spot on the table and suddenly announce that she had forgotten something, or that we needed more butter, or more sweet tea, and she would bounce back into the kitchen.

  A couple of times, I looked up at Dad sitting across from me, and I would catch him staring at me like he was afraid I might disappear. Next to me, Mom glanced around nervously every now and again.

  Taylor, seated at the head of the table, kept asking how everyone’s food was. His voice was oddly high, and he kept looking around like he was sure this was all a dream, one that he was bound to wake up from any moment.

  “You should tell one of your stories, Mr. Taylor!” Sammy said finally.

  “The one about the snow leopard,” Caleb suggested.

  “Or about the tuli
p,” Sammy said.

  “Stories?” Aunt Clare asked.

  “Taylor collects them,” I explained proudly, “from all around the world. He told them to us when we helped him unpack, and he’s putting them all—”

  I stopped short, looking at Taylor. I wasn’t sure if he was ready to tell everyone else about his plans or not. He nodded.

  “He’s putting them in the lighthouse on Keeper’s Island,” I continued. “He’s turning it into an observatory in honor of Matty and Uncle Ben.”

  “Is that true?” Mom asked.

  “It is,” Taylor said. “I bought the island after the accident. I think it’s time someone did something with it.”

  “Matty would love it,” Mom said. “And Ben, too.”

  From her voice, I was sure that Mom was crying, but when I looked at her, there were no tears welling in her eyes.

  Maybe, I thought, there were tears you could see and tears you could only hear.

  Maybe Mom had spent so long behind her camera and her doll’s smile that she didn’t know how to express some things like other people did. Maybe with Mom, I was always going to have to look a little more closely to know what she was feeling.

  Taylor started to tell the story about the snow leopard. When he was done, Mom asked him when he’d been in the Himalayas. It turned out they’d been there only a few months apart. Then Jai asked if Taylor had ever been to India. When he said he had, Uncle Amar wanted to know everywhere he’d stayed, and eaten, and visited. Then Sammy went to the living room and retrieved several of the scrapbooks she’d filled with Taylor’s pictures, and everyone passed them around the table, peppering him with even more questions about his travels.

  When the conversation died down again, Betsy announced that it was time for my pie. She served each of us a slice with a little mountain of vanilla ice cream on top.

  I watched Mom as she ate. She closed her eyes, and for the first time since we got there, her face seemed to relax. “I can’t believe you made this,” she said when she had swallowed her first bite. “It’s fantastic, Miranda.”

  “Best pie I’ve ever eaten,” Dad said, digging in for another bite.

  “Exactly what I’ve been saying,” Uncle Amar said, winking at me.

  I was glad that everyone liked it, but I wished they would slow down a little bit. I didn’t want the night to end.

  All of us around the table had taken different paths to get there. Some had had to go around the world and back again. But we had finally made it.

  We were family.

  We were together.

  And we were home.

  53

  “I can’t believe you’re actually leaving tomorrow,” Sammy said, sighing.

  “Me either,” Caleb agreed.

  The three of us sat on the porch watching the very last sunset of my summer in August Isle while the grown-ups did dishes inside.

  “I know,” I replied. “It’s gone by so fast.”

  A sea breeze combed over us, tickling our cheeks and rustling our hair. I didn’t want tomorrow to come.

  But the anchor of dread in my belly wasn’t there anymore. At least, it wasn’t so heavy.

  “We’ll talk all the time,” Sammy assured me.

  “You’ll be back next summer, right?” Caleb asked.

  “I hope I’ll be back every summer,” I said. “My mom and dad, too. We’ll have to come for the opening of the observatory.”

  Taylor had told us over pie that he was going to try to have it ready for next summer.

  “Which reminds me,” I said, turning to Caleb. “Why didn’t you tell us that Taylor was a first name when your dad looked up those property records? If I’d known his last name was Crawford then, I would have realized who he was.”

  Caleb shrugged. “I didn’t know that Crawford was your mom’s name,” he replied. “And I wasn’t there when you guys met him. I figured you knew it was his first name and he just wanted you to call him that. Like how I call my dentist Dr. Rick. I don’t know . . . adults are weird about names.”

  “True,” Sammy agreed.

  “Yeah, I guess. Hey,” I said, bumping Sammy’s knee with my own. “I’m sorry there didn’t end up being any treasures or criminals or anything on Keeper’s Island. You didn’t get your scoop.”

  A smile stretched over her face as she flicked her hair back. “What are you talking about?” she said. “A new observatory on Keeper’s Island is probably the most exciting thing that’s happened here for a hundred years. And I’m the only reporter in town who knows about it.”

  “You’re right,” I said. “And I’m sure Taylor will give an exclusive to Sammy Grover, journalist extraordinaire!”

  “Actually,” she replied slowly, “I’ve been thinking about that.”

  “About what?” Caleb asked.

  “About my name. I want to be Sameera again, at least for my journalist name. I’ve been thinking about what Charlie said, about how if she were starting out as a scientist today, she wouldn’t have changed her name. Because she was never ashamed of being a woman. It was just easier to get a job with a man’s name.”

  “Who’s Charlie?” Caleb asked.

  Sammy ignored him. “And I’m not ashamed of being Indian, either. I never have been. I just thought it would be easier to fit in if I was . . . less Indian. But I’m proud of my family, and I want everyone to know it. So people are just going to have to get used to it. Because I’m not changing who I am for anybody anymore.”

  I slap her a high five. “And I’m really proud to have you as my friend, Sameera Grover. I wouldn’t change you for the world.”

  “Suh-mee-rah,” Caleb said carefully. “I like it. Just don’t forget the little people, though. When you win your Academy Award or whatever.”

  “That’s for movies, bonehead,” Sammy said. “I’m going to win a Pulitzer.”

  “Either way, I get a mention in your acceptance speech, right?”

  I giggled.

  “Hey,” Sammy said, “you never told us earlier what happened with your mom. Are you guys, like, okay?”

  I took a deep breath and told them all about my conversation with Mom. I told them how when Dad came back to my hospital room, he said that all three of us were going to go see a counselor together when we got home. Someone who could help us learn to love each other in ways that didn’t hurt.

  “See?” Sammy said. “I told you it wasn’t your fault. But I guess you needed to hear it from your mom, huh?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I think I did.”

  “It’s cool you guys are getting kind of a fresh start,” Caleb said.

  “What about you?” I asked. “Why didn’t your parents come tonight?”

  He kicked a pebble off the bottom step. “I thought about inviting them,” he said, “but they can’t be in the same room together. And I couldn’t choose one and not the other, so . . .”

  “What’s going to happen now?” Sammy asked.

  “I’m not really sure,” he said. “I guess everything is gonna change.”

  “Not everything,” I said quietly.

  Caleb turned to me, eyes hopeful. “What do you mean?”

  “Well, it’s like Sammy said,” I replied. “You don’t have to change. I don’t think we should let what’s happening with our parents define us. Just because yours are, like, breaking up . . . it doesn’t mean that you’re broken.”

  “Yeah,” Sammy agreed. “And you can come over to my house anytime you want.”

  The text message alert on Sammy’s phone bleeped from inside the house, and she leaped up to get it.

  After she’d disappeared inside, I cleared my throat. “I’m, um, here for you, Caleb,” I said. “You know, if you ever need someone to talk to or anything.”

  The moonlight turned his cheeks silver. “Thanks, Miranda.”

  “Guess we should go back inside now, huh?”

  “Guess so.”

  I stood up, but before I could go in, Caleb reached for my hand. My sto
mach suddenly went all sparkly inside.

  “Hey, Miranda?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Um. It was pretty awesome what you did. Sailing to that island all by yourself. You’ve kind of, like, made this whole summer awesome. I guess . . . what I’m trying to say is . . . I’m gonna miss you. Can I, um—?”

  He leaned closer, and I felt my breath catch in my chest. I nodded.

  With that, he leaned over and brushed a kiss against the corner of my mouth.

  He pulled away just as Sammy barreled out from the house. “You guys!” she cried. “It’s happening!”

  “What’s happening?” Caleb and I asked innocently.

  Caleb cast a sheepish grin at me.

  “The turtles,” Sammy said. “They’re coming up from the nest. We have to get down to the beach!”

  “Oh, cool,” Caleb said. “Let me just get my phone and stuff.”

  He disappeared into the house, and I raised my hand to my cheek. If not for the warmth I could still feel there, I would have thought I had imagined my very first kiss.

  “What’s up with you?” Sammy asked.

  “Nothing,” I said. I realized then that everyone had their secrets, but not all secrets had to be bad. Some things—a first kiss, an attempt to learn a new language—were okay to keep to yourself for a while. And besides, I would tell Sammy soon, just not right now. Maybe one day, I would even tell Mom. “This summer has been full of surprises, hasn’t it?”

  54

  Sammy herded all of us from the house. Even Slug helped, nudging up against people’s knees as they filed from the dining room back through the living room. He stared woefully up as Taylor shut the door behind Betsy, and Safira began to screech like I’d heard her do on the island.

  “That bird has one healthy set of lungs,” Uncle Amar said, covering his ears.

  “Sounds kind of like you singing in the shower,” Jai replied.

  “Just for that, I’m taking an extra long one tonight,” Uncle Amar said, wrapping an arm over Jai’s shoulders and ruffling his son’s perfectly gelled hair. Jai ducked away, scowling, while Sammy and I laughed.

  “Do you think I have time to run back and get my camera?” Mom asked.