by Callie Hart
April last year. The handwriting had changed from girly, loopy cursive to a more elegant, sprawling text over the years, but the lettering was still unmistakably from the same hand. I avoided the words written onto the paper, not wanting to read them yet. For some reason it felt like skipping to the end of a novel and ruining the story for myself, though in this instance I already knew what happened at the end. Magda was dead, and now so was Ronan. Sully was the last man standing.
After Rose had left, I’d ducked into the office and grabbed the book before I’d had a chance to change my mind. I needed some more background history, and low and behold it looked like I was going to get it in spades. There had to be over a hundred entries in Magda’s journal. Some of the pages were rigid and crackled as they were turned. Others were covered with photos. Some bore event tickets, plane tickets…stubs to movies. Closer to the end of the book, I caught sight of a sonogram tacked to a page, and I had to stop myself from investigating closer to see if it was Connor or Amie Magda had commemorated in her book.
Amie sat with me the entire afternoon, dipping in and out of sleep, crying sporadically in quiet, heartbroken jags that made me ache inside for her. Connor remained in his room, rainbow hat jammed onto his head, not moving, not saying a word. He’d lashed out and tried to kick me when I tried to pick him up and take him into my arms, growling fiercely, and so I’d left him alone in the silence of his room, hoping I was doing the right thing.
The rain arrived around four, hammering at the windows, rattling them in their frames, and wind tore at the house, howling through the brickwork in the old pantry, the only part of the house that didn’t look like it had been renovated, causing the kitchen door to slam closed behind me every time I went in there to get juice or cookies for Amie.
I couldn’t stop thinking about Magda’s journal. I couldn’t stop thinking about Sully’s appearance earlier, either, or the harsh way that he’d spoken. He’d been stark and unwelcoming, but he’d also been afraid, too—when he heard Amie calling out for her father, he’d looked so lost that the transformation had startled me. I needed to know why he’d taken the time to come to the house not once but twice in order to tell me I’d be wasting my time if I tried to fulfill Ronan’s wishes. The mystery of it all was killing me.
I flicked through the journal, letting it fall open midway through—a page full of photos. I only knew the images were of Sully because Magda had written underneath each one with a title, time and date.
Sully, Fort Benning, April 2003.
Sully, Times Square, December 2003. Four days until deployment.
Sully, Kabul, May 2004.
Sully, with Daniels and Rogers, Kabul, January 2005.
Underneath this entry, a faded, small photograph was taped to the paper: Sully, in full military uniform, sun blazing, a white hot blister in the background, two tall black guys also in uniform with their arms slung over his shoulders. All three of the men were smiling, teeth showing, sweat on their brows, but there was something a little off about the picture. The smiles seemed edgy, like they’d been painted on. The men stood tall and stiff, as though ready to drop the pretense of happiness at the first sign of trouble in order to pick up the rifles at their feet and start fighting.
None of them looked like they wanted to be there at all.
******
I didn’t see Sully again for a month. Four weeks passed by, and not a peep. Perhaps this wouldn’t have been so strange if the island weren’t so small, and if everyone didn’t keep saying, oh how funny. You just missed Sully, to me. It was like he’d tagged me with a GPS tracker somehow, knew my exact location at all times, and was determined to avoid me no matter the cost.
CPS checked in with me, sent Sheryl back to the island to make sure I wasn’t neglecting the children (which I wasn’t), and they signed off on them staying with me until next spring. Rose’s presence was an immeasurable help. I was using some of the allowance Ronan had set aside for me to pay Dr. Fielding for Skype sessions with Connor and Amie. His time with Amie appeared to be helping her a lot, but Connor was proving harder to reach. He often sat in front of the computer screen and refused to speak at all when Fielding asked him questions. If he did speak, then he shouted, screamed and swore until Fielding declared the session counter productive and shut things down. Still, I hoped for a breakthrough. And soon. Really, really soon. My last nerve was frayed down to the quick, but more importantly I felt like I was failing Connor and Ronan at the same time, and that didn’t sit well with me at all.
November was frigid and awful. The sky was the color of war—gray and black and grim—and the rain rarely broke. Rose was at home with the children when I finally saw Sully Fletcher again.
“There we go, sweetie. Whew, that’s a heavy one. Must have some good stuff in there.” Sam, the woman who ran the post office, slid the package I’d come to collect toward me across the counter, smiling. The package was from Mom—probably more winter clothing. She was terrified I was going to freeze to death. Sam glanced over my shoulder, lifting a hand in greeting. “Hi, Sully. You can leave that there if you like? I’ll swing by on my way home to pay you.”
I spun around so quick I almost lost my balance. Sure enough, Sully was standing in the open doorway of the post office, and in his hands he was holding a huge, beautiful rocking chair. When he saw me, his expression changed from flat disinterest to open horror. “Sure thing, Sam.” He put the rocking chair down next to the door, bending at the waist, and I couldn’t help but notice how close he’d cropped his hair, or the curls of wood shavings that were stuck to the thick plaid material of his shirt. There was a black smudge on the back of his neck, as if he’d rubbed greasy fingers there and no one had told him about the stain marking his skin. He didn’t turn around again or say another word to Sam. He just walked through the door and left.
“I wouldn’t do it to myself if I were you.”
“Pardon me?” I turned back to find that Sam was giving me a knowing, wary look.
“Sully Fletcher. As handsome as the devil on Sunday. Had every single one of the women on this island in a tizz at some point, but he ain’t never looked at a single one of them. Trust me. That one’s more trouble than he’s worth. You need a cabinet made, or a chair fixed, then Sully’s your man. If you’re looking for someone with a gentle and tender heart to snuggle up with on the couch when it’s raining, then you’re better off getting a dog.”
“I’m not looking for that. And if I were, I definitely wouldn’t be interested in Sully.”
“Hmm.” From the look on her face, Sam didn’t believe me one bit. “All right then. But just so you know, that one didn’t come back from the desert the same as when he left, if you get my meaning. Just be careful around him. And don’t let those little ones around him too much, either.” There wasn’t any fear of that happening; Sully had made himself perfectly clear back at the house four weeks ago, and he hadn’t changed his mind. I’d heard nothing from him regarding his niece and nephew. I’d heard nothing from him, period.
Outside, I caught him climbing into a beaten truck so covered in mud that I couldn’t even make out what color it was. He wanted to throw the car in drive and disappear, I could tell, but I wasn’t going to let him. I stepped in front of the vehicle and laid my hands flat against the hood.
Sully leaned out of his window and growled, “What in holy fuck do you think you’re doing?” He sounded so similar to Ronan, it was uncanny. I’d never heard Ronan say fuck, but I could imagine it all too well.
“You’re avoiding me. And the children. Why?”
“You’re insane.” Sully looked around the inside of his truck, like he was looking for someone to agree with him. “I’m a busy guy, Miss Ophelia Lang from California. I have work to do. Why would I be playing stupid games and avoiding you?”
“That’s what I’d like to know. You didn’t even come to Ronan’s funeral.” The day had been one of the few fine days I’d experienced on The Causeway. The sun had shone for the
entire forty minutes I’d stood at Ronan’s graveside with the children, the temperature cool but fresh, and the fact that so few people had shown up to say their farewells to Ronan had been heartbreaking. Back in New York, there would have been work associates, friends, neighbors… Here on the island, the only person who I’d known at the tiny Catholic Church had been Rose and that was it.
“Of course I didn’t come.” Sully turned the key in the ignition; the car’s engine roared into life, startling me. “I’m not above running over a girl, you know. I’ve done it before.”
“Where? In Afghanistan?”
Sully sat back in his seat like he’d been slapped. “And what would you know about Afghanistan?”
I’d obviously touched a very, very raw nerve. “Nothing.”
“That’s right. You don’t know anything.”
“Maybe I should change that. Maybe I should just read Magda’s journal, and—”
“What did you just say?” Sully stopped trying to maneuver the car past me and gaped at me out of the window. His anger seemed to have dissipated in a puff of smoke.
“Magda’s journal. Ronan told me to read it. To understand what happened between you two better.”
“Is that so?” Sully leaned forward, forearms against the steering wheel. With eyebrows so high up his forehead they were almost touching his hairline, he tilted his head to one side. He was angry; I could feel the tension snapping in the air. Given the look in his eyes, I wouldn’t be surprised if he did run me over. “And what have you learned so far, Lang?” he snapped. He looked suspicious. Almost worried.
“I haven’t learned anything. I haven’t read it,” I snapped back. It was true. I hadn’t read a single entry since I’d first picked up the journal after Ronan died. Oh, I’d wanted to for sure. It still sat on my nightstand, and night after night I warred with myself, trying to convince myself of the fact that reading the contents of the journal wasn’t invading Sully’s privacy. But it was. I knew it was.
“Like I’m gonna believe that,” Sully growled.
“You can believe whatever you want. I only know what everyone else on this ridiculously tiny island knows. Ronan came back from deployment, and suddenly…” I didn’t feel brave enough to say the rest out loud. Not to his face.
“Suddenly he was marrying my girlfriend and having a baby?” Sully had gone pale. His eyes were filled with a hint of madness that finally, finally set him apart from Ronan. What was he going to do next? Scream at me some more? I could take it. I could if it meant that he and I were talking. A month had already gone by, and Sheryl hadn’t found anywhere suitable for Connor and Amie. Another five months would easily fly by in the blink of an eye, and then the two children would be shipped off to the group home after all, regardless of what I wanted for them.
I’d come to the conclusion that I needed to complete the task Ronan hired me to do and get Sully to take them, but now that I was standing in front of him and he was acting so unhinged I wasn’t so sure that was the best course of action anymore.
“Yes,” I answered him. “It wasn’t fair. Ronan shouldn’t have done it. But at the end of the day, he couldn’t help who he fell in love with either.”
Sitting perfectly still, Sully seemed to try and digest these words for a second, which could have explained why he looked like he was about to throw up. And then he said, “He and I shared the same heart. Of course we were bound to fall in love with the same girl.” He didn’t try and get around me again. Instead, Sully put the car in reverse and gunned the engine, tearing off backwards down the street, a shower of dirt and small rocks kicked up by the tires, raining down on me as he sped away.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Happy Birthday, Rose
“Did you manage to—god, what have you got all over your face?” Rose met me at the door, Amie hot on her heels, a slab of cake in her tiny hand, chocolate frosting all around her mouth and all over her cheeks. Rose saw the sharp look on my face and had the decency to look apologetic. “Sorry. She didn’t touch her lunch. It was this or nothing. Why do you look like you’ve just been quad biking?”
“Sully,” I said.
“Ah.” Clearly the one-word answer was explanation enough. Rose produced a pack of tissues from her pocket. “I was just about to clean up the chocolate monster, but looks like you might need these more than she does.”
“Thanks.”
“I could speak to him, y’know? To Sully? He might not be so polite to you, but he wouldn’t dare be rude to me. He’s coming to my birthday party next week. You’ll be there, too. He’s going to have to learn how to keep a civil tongue by then, or I’ll cut the damn thing right out of his head.”
Ah. Rose had mentioned the birthday party a couple of times, but I hadn’t had the heart to tell her I wasn’t going to be able to come. What was I supposed to do with Connor and Amie? And anyway, now that I’d found out Sully was going to be there, my desire to mingle and be sociable with the inhabitants of the island had strangely disintegrated. The thought of Sully at a party was just so out there that I couldn’t help but smile, though. I could just picture the uptight bastard hovering with a plate of cheese in his hand, looking more than a little uncomfortable while a volley of people tried to talk to him about the weather and his carpentry business. I felt manic laughter bubbling up at the back of my throat.
Truth of the matter was, if he showed up, he would probably hang around for twenty minutes to fulfill his social obligations, and then he’d make his exit as quickly as possible while no one was looking.
“No, it’s okay, Rose. If he doesn’t want to be nice, then that’s on him. I wouldn’t want to submit the kids to his shitty attitude anyway. And I think…it would probably be so confusing for them as well. I mean, he looks just like Ronan. I nearly had a heart attack when I set eyes on him. If Amie saw him…” It didn’t even bear thinking about.
“Hmm. Perhaps you’re right.” She didn’t say she wouldn’t talk to Sully, though. Her mouth had an odd quirk to it. I could tell just by looking at her that she was already planning what she was going to say to him and how she was going to say it, regardless if I begged or pleaded. I didn’t waste my breath asking her to keep her mouth shut. If there was one thing I’d learned about Rose in the brief time I had known her, it was that she was extraordinarily stubborn, and when she made up her mind about something, there was no moving her on it.
******
A week later: a party.
Rose’s name had been painted on pieces of paper one letter at a time and pegged to a piece of fishing line that ran from one end of her cramped living room to the other. Good thing she had such a short name. Happy Bday was tacked up underneath it, the second word butchered for the sake of convenience. Rose ran around the house, flitting from kitchen, to dining room, to living room, thundering up the stairs to the den she’d set up in her spare room, where a number of children including Connor and Amie were watching Star Wars. In most circumstances, probably not the best choice for a little girl Amie’s age, but then again Amie wasn’t like most little girls. Her love of dinosaurs also stretched to a love of space ships and aliens, so Star Wars was apparently going down a treat.
Rose’s invites, sent to everyone on the island between the ages of twenty and sixty-five, had clearly stated the party started at seven thirty, however people started rolling through the door at five, which seemed completely normal to everyone apart from me. I was dashing about almost as crazily as Rose, pulling finger food out of the oven, chilling as much white wine and beer in the fridge as I could possibly fit in while trying to pin my hair back at the same time and hop into my dress.
Speaking of the dress: tight and black, with a thin cross strap that ran over my shoulder blades. No chance of a bra here. It was so cold even inside the house that Rose’s eyes nearly popped out of her head when she saw me wearing it.
“Jesus, O. You do realize Mr. Sweetwater’s coming tonight, don’t you? The poor bastard had a pacemaker installed a couple of months a
go. If he sees your nipples cutting at your dress like that, he’ll keel over and die.”
“I haven’t got anything else to wear.” Ronan hadn’t exactly made my trip to the island sound like a vacation. I wasn’t even going to bring the dress I was wearing, but something had told me I might need it. Admittedly I’d have been better served by something more conservative, but now I just had to work with what I had.
“Here, then,” Rose said, grabbing me by the wrist and dragging me into her bedroom. From the top drawer of the chest next to her bed, she pulled out a box of Tit Tape as if by magic. “Tape those puppies up, before you have people talking.”
Holly, a fifteen-year-old girl wearing a Slipknot t-shirt, showed up at seven to babysit the children. She smiled, displaying two overly large front teeth when Rose introduced us.
“So nice to meet you,” she gushed. “You’re from California, aren’t you? I’ve watched every single episode of The O.C. I can’t wait to visit there one day. Is it always sunny there?”
“Actually, I guess it kind of is,” I told her. I’d taken the balmy West Coast weather for granted up until I stepped foot on The Causeway. Now, the brief snatches of sunshine that infrequently broke their way through the cloud cover were something that people went and stood outside for, craning their necks up at the sky overhead, squinting into the light like it was a goddamn miracle.
Holly beamed. “Do you think you could tell me all about it? Only when you’re free, of course. I don’t mind watching the children for you in return.”
“Of course. You can come over anytime.”
By nine, Rose’s place was packed and the windows were running with condensation. A huge three-tier cake was broken out, and everyone sang Happy Birthday in a cacophony of drunk, out of tune voices. That’s when I noticed Sully, propped up against the wall by the television, holding a beer in one hand and an untouched hot dog in the other. He wasn’t paying attention to the food or the drink, or the people singing around him. He was staring straight at me with a dark, brooding look in his eyes that made my heart stop dead in my chest.