Montauk

by Nicola Harrison

  Thomas moved to the desk and shuffled some papers, keeping his eyes downcast; then he sighed. “She hasn’t made it easy on me, that’s for sure. I go out there when I can, but he’s thirteen years old and he barely even knows me. I can’t risk losing this job or I’d have no money to send for him. I write, but I don’t think he sees the letters. I’m pretty sure she keeps them from him.”

  I stood next to him at the desk and placed my hand gently on his shoulder. “It must be very hard, knowing he’s so close.”

  “He’s starting to get more curious; he’s been out here a few times. But I know he doesn’t feel close to me—it’s like he doesn’t trust me; I don’t blame him.”

  He opened the desk drawer and took out a cloth bag: then he removed a rounded piece of wood the size of a potato from the bag and a small whittling knife.

  “I’m carving this for him.” He handed me the smooth sculpture.

  “What is it?”

  “The handle to a pocketknife. He might never see it if I send it, but I feel good making something for him. I like to think of his hands holding it, out in the woods exploring, cutting down branches, carving his name in tree trunks.”

  “He’ll love it, I’m sure.”

  “Yeah, well, I have to do things to keep busy up here on the night shifts. Don’t tell anyone I told you, but Milton knits when he’s up here!” We both laughed.

  “You should give it to him in person, go over there and make sure you get to put it in his hands.”

  Thomas looked down at the handle and shaved it slowly with the knife, carefully, not speaking.

  “I should do that,” he said; after a while, he looked up and nodded. “If it turns out all right I’ll take the boat over and give it to him. He’d like that.”

  There was a silence between us as he whittled away at the carving. I felt I owed him something, some hurt of my own, some secret.

  “The doctor as good as told me that I’ve missed my chance to have a baby,” I said.

  “Really?” He looked surprised.

  I nodded.

  “But you’re so young.”

  “Not according to the doctor.”

  “I’m really sorry to hear that, because you’d be a damned good mother, a fine one.”

  It was sad to say it, to admit to another human being that I would be childless; it made it feel more real, more hurtful. I knew he was trying to be kind. He was a kind soul. But nonetheless I felt deeply, deeply sad and tears formed in my eyes. I willed them not to roll over onto my cheeks. I refused to blink and my eyes started to burn until finally he put down the carving and pointed to a rickety old wooden chair against the wall.

  “Why don’t you pull that over here and come sit by me,” he said, putting the pocketknife back in the drawer. “It won’t stand up for us keepers, but I’m sure it will hold your little frame.”

  I brought it to the side of the desk and sat down. Our knees touched for just a second; then I moved slightly to the left.

  “So, what are you planning to do with your day tomorrow?” he asked.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I’ve become quite fond of my time up here, but I’m sure I’ll find something to occupy myself with on your day off. Sunbathe at the beach perhaps.” I smiled.

  “It’s a tough life you lead.”

  “It is. And what will you do?” I asked. “Stay in bed and rest, I hope.”

  “I’ve got the keepers’ dinner tomorrow night; we do it every two weeks in the main house. It’s supposed to be good for morale, time to discuss any issues at the light.” He rolled his eyes. “But I always cook.”

  “How are you going to do that in your state?”

  “I’ll be fine,” he said.

  “Thomas, what’s the point in me helping you all week if you’re going to go and run yourself into the ground the first chance you have?”

  “I’m not completely useless,” he said. “I just have to find a way to get to town and pick up groceries.”

  “I can do that—”

  “I’ll send Worthington in the morning.”

  I wanted to be needed. I had been feeling indispensable and hated the idea of it fading even a little.

  “If you’re worried about me, maybe you could come anyway. Keep an eye on me while I cook.”

  I pinched my lips together, hiding the smile from spreading into the corners of my mouth. “I could help,” I said. “I’d be happy to.”

  “So are you any good in the kitchen?” I said, turning to him.

  “I’m all right,” he said.

  “Better than me, I hope.”

  “You’re a fine cook,” he said, “and even better company.”

  “So what’s on the menu?” I asked.

  “I’ll surprise you. Actually, I wish you could stay for dinner.”

  “With Milton and Worthington, I don’t think that would go down well.”

  “You’ve done so much for me. My constant companion these last few days, helping me in so many ways. I wish I could do something to thank you.”

  I smiled. “You are, actually. It won’t make sense to you, but coming up here, helping you, it is helping me, too.”

  He paused and looked at me inquisitively. “Have you always done things like this?”

  “Like what? Playing assistant to an injured lighthouse keeper?” I laughed.

  “Walking into someone’s life and doing something remarkable. A lot of people want to be that way and to think of themselves that way, but few can actually live up to the way they think they ought to be. You’re just good by nature, aren’t you?”

  “No, I’m not one of those people. Sometimes I look at my life and I think what am I doing here? What am I even doing with my life? When I meet people who are doing important things, like you, you save lives by doing your job, and my friend Dolly, she’s not saving lives, but she’s creating things, and working to carry on and expand her father’s business, and she’s a woman! And Mr. Rosen, the newspaper editor, he interviews people like Albert Einstein and spreads the word about the amazing inventions and discoveries. People are doing remarkable things. Sometimes I wish I was doing some good. I don’t know if that makes sense.”

  “You are doing more than you know,” he said. “And you’re doing the best you can; you’ve had a tough road.” He took my hand in his, surprising me, and looked into my eyes. “You’ve always had a good heart, you’re an incredibly strong person and somehow you’ve ended up with someone who doesn’t see you for who you really are.…”

  He stopped, looked down at my hand and squeezed it.

  “You don’t know enough about me to say all that,” I said quietly. In one instant I felt that he understood me, he knew me better than anyone had ever known me, and then it was as if he got lost in his thoughts and was thinking of someone else. “Are you feeling okay?” I asked, but he didn’t look up, just shook his head.

  “Bea, there’s something I need to tell you.” As he said it the door to the widow’s walk flew open and whacked against the wall, making a loud crack. We both jumped and Thomas cringed in pain as he did so.

  “Oh my God,” I said, feeling my heart pound. For a second I thought it was a gunshot.

  “It’s okay,” he said. “We mustn’t have fastened the latch right; it’s just the wind.”

  We got up and pushed the door tightly shut and he secured the bolt firmly in place.

  “That really scared me,” I said.

  * * *

  When we sat back down he took up carving the wooden pocketknife again. I rested my head back against the wall and watched him, letting my eyes linger a fraction too long on his face, on the deep blue color of his eyes, and the left eyebrow that grew slightly different from the right, as if he’d gone over the handlebars as a kid and had a scar where the hair didn’t grow back quite right. I had a strange urge to reach over and touch it.

  “What are you looking at?” he asked. “My raggedy hair? I know it needs a cut.”

  “No, although, yes
, you could do with a trim,” I said. “How did you get that scar on your eyebrow?”

  “What scar?” He set the carving down on the floor and touched his brow.

  “That one,” I said as I reached over and ran my thumb over the white skin.

  He put his hand on my hand and held it there on his face for a moment, my palm resting on the side of his cheek. I felt a ripple run under my skin throughout my whole body, a longing to stay in that moment. Then he dropped his hand slowly, and I sat with my back against the wall.

  “What are you hiding from?” he asked. “Anyone who wants to spend time up here is usually escaping something in real life.”

  I shrugged.

  “Come on. I’ve had rumrunners; I’ve had dogs; I’ve even had one village kid run out from school and hide out up here for days before we knew it. But I haven’t figured out what you’re running from yet.”

  “Nothing,” I said quietly.

  “So anyway, it’s from jumping out of the crib,” he said.

  “What’s is?”

  “The scar.” He pointed to his eyebrow. “I got it from jumping out of the crib. Apparently I used to jump and jump and jump as a baby, getting higher and higher and higher, and then I’d propel myself over the rails and land with a thud on the floor, never wanted to be caged in, I suppose.” He laughed.

  “A wild one from the start.”

  “That’s right. I’d cry until someone came and got me off the floor and put me back in. One day I catapulted myself right out onto a wooden rocking horse that was next to the crib, cut my forehead right open.” He rubbed the scar.

  “And here you are,” I said. “You don’t feel caged in here?”

  “Never,” he said. “With the ocean surrounding me, I feel free and at peace with the world.”

  I nodded and in that moment I knew exactly what he meant.

  21

  Elizabeth and I sat on the pebbled beach looking out on to Fort Pond Bay. Baby Jake lay on his tummy on a blanket and he was picking up stones and pebbles one by one, occasionally trying to pop one in his mouth. Elizabeth kept reaching down, taking it out of his hand and setting it back on the beach, and he would pick up another one. This happened over and over. Sometimes she wasn’t even looking; she just calmly moved it out of reach and he found another, rounder, smoother. That’s something you learn, I thought, or maybe it’s just something that develops in a mother, this innate knowledge and connection with your child to know what he’ll do next, what he’ll be drawn to, what could harm him and how to protect him. It was hard to imagine ever having that kind of intuition. I wondered if all mothers had it or just some, and once you became a mother did you have this intuition about children in general or just your own? It was as if Elizabeth was part of some mysterious, imaginary club that I might never be invited to join.

  Down by the water’s edge Johnny and his older brother Billy were skipping flat stones on the water’s smooth surface. They were waiting for the last of the fishing boats to come in so they could see the catches for the day. Elizabeth could recognize the fishing boats already on the horizon as they returned from sea.

  “Here comes Tom Joyce!” Elizabeth called out. “Go to the dock and see what he’s got,” she said.

  Patrick was working at the post office that morning and we were waiting for him to come back with the car so I could get a ride to the lighthouse. The bike was good for getting back when I had no other choice, but it took me almost an hour to ride up there and by the time I arrived I was pretty tired already. We’d squeeze the bicycle into the back seat of the car and I’d use it to get back to the Manor at odd hours—thankfully the ride back was downhill. Besides, Elizabeth said Patrick had warmed to the idea of me helping at the lighthouse. I knew it was risky for them to help me, it was risky for all four of us, but it was a risk that we all decided was worth taking so that Thomas wouldn’t lose his job.

  I was tired from all the back and forth over the past few days. I hadn’t felt that way since the first week my father’s grocery store business expanded into a warehouse store and took off overnight. He hadn’t expected so much business to come his way in such a short time and he hadn’t hired the help to unpack deliveries overnight to be prepared for the morning shoppers. He, my mother and I stayed up three nights in a row unloading deliveries until he finally hired some permanent stock boys. But just like those nights, my time at the lighthouse left me dog tired but happy. Useful and purposeful.

  When I ran up and down those tower stairs several times a day, to get the logbook, to bring polish for the lens or to bring some food up for Thomas and me to eat when all was calm, I’d feel myself perspiring. I was a teenager again, active and engaged with the world, working so hard that by the end of the day, or whatever hour I returned, I’d fall into bed, needing sleep so I could do it all again the next day.

  Elizabeth sat Jake up and placed a few white shells in front of him, just a little out of reach.

  “Look,” she said. “He can sit by himself now.” He reached for the shells and almost had one of them clenched in his tiny, pudgy hand before he spilled over to the side, lay there for a second, silent, then cried. “Oh, my poor baby,” Elizabeth cooed. “You can almost do it,” she said, “almost.”

  She picked him up, gave him a kiss, then handed him to me, “It’s okay, Jakey,” she said. “Get a snuggle from Beatrice; that will make you feel better.” His cry slowed to a snuffle, and a whimper. I held him to my chest and breathed in the smell of his hair, baby powder and salt air.

  “You’re a beach baby, aren’t you?” I said. “Going to grow up with your toes in the sand and the salt in your hair, just like your brothers, and your mama.”

  “Please,” Elizabeth said, “I don’t remember the last time I had salt in my hair.”

  “You live less than thirty seconds from the water.”

  “I know. I used to love swimming. When I was pregnant with my Billy I would spend hours in the water, just floating, like the whale I was.” She laughed. “I just don’t have time now.”

  Her boys ran past us and up to the house laughing. “What did you get?” Elizabeth called out as they shot past.

  “Cod!” they shouted back, laughing.

  “What’s so funny, boys? What else is in that bucket?”

  “Nothing.” They were in her front yard now.

  “Johnny and Billy, get over here and bring me that bucket,” she said firmly.

  They scuffed over. “It’s cod; I told you,” Billy said.

  “And blowfish,” Johnny said, bursting into a fit of giggles.

  “Oh, Lord.” Elizabeth shook her head.

  Johnny reached into the bucket and pulled out a fish about the size of my hand, laughing hysterically. He crouched down onto his knees and laid the fish down in front of us; then he tickled the fish’s belly and the thing puffed up to a hideous spiky round ball about twelve inches in diameter. I jolted back from where I was sitting.

  “Go put that cod in the icebox please, and don’t make a mess of the place before your father gets home.”

  “Okay.” They were still giggling.

  Elizabeth shook her head and the boys ran off. Once they were in the front yard I saw them kicking around a deflated old soccer ball.

  “Those boys,” she sighed. “It’s a good thing Billy’s old enough to work this year.”

  “Really, he seems so young still. Where does he work?”

  “At Dick’s in town, he works the soda fountain and puts the newspapers together, whatever they need him to do. It’s good that he can bring some money in over the summer, but they need to be back in school. I hope they get the building in order before September.”

  “What’s wrong with the school?”

  “It’s falling apart. The roof is caving in at one end of the building; the shingles need to be redone—God forbid we have a bad storm this winter; they’d fly off like flower petals. You know, several classes had to move out of their classrooms to other locations,” she said. �
��One moved to the church; literally the kids were sitting in the pews and the teacher stood up front like a priest! A few other classes doubled up.”

  “That doesn’t sound very productive,” I said.

  “It’s not. The problem is so much money has gone into making this town a tourist destination, they’ve forgotten about the bread and butter—us. And then the developer lost all of his money I heard, so now what?”

  I felt ashamed of being one of those “tourists.”

  “Well, it’s not that they’ve forgotten about us,” she went on, perhaps trying to put me at ease. “Actually, part of the school is beautiful, really a good place, and when they first started building it up they brought in some good new teachers. They even have a theater teacher, which is something we never would have imagined out here; guess they wanted to train the kids to grow up to work in showbiz, entertain the summer guests maybe.”

  I shook my head, hoping these kids’ education wasn’t being shaped by the city folk.

  “Don’t get me wrong,” she said. “It’s great; the kids love it. It’s brand new for them. I support it, even if I know that my lads are going to end up out on the ocean just like their father.”

  I nodded.

  “It’s just that they brought in all these fancy teachers, but we don’t have the space to put them anywhere. We’ve fifth and sixth grade squeezed into one classroom. The kids in fifth grade are bored to death by the time sixth grade comes around; it’s the same stuff they learned the year before.”

  Elizabeth turned back to the water, relatively unfazed by the squealing going on behind us. “Anyway, it’ll all work out.”

  “I’m sure it will. Your boys seem like they’ll thrive no matter where they are.”

  She nodded, her thoughts elsewhere. “What’s it like?” she asked. “Living in the big city?”

  “Where? Manhattan? It’s like living anywhere really, except there are a lot of cars and everyone’s in a hurry to get somewhere.”

  “I’d love to go,” Elizabeth said, looking dreamily out to the horizon. “I just want to see what it’s like.”